Re: H1N5 (and Bakker's virus extinction hypothesis) now H5N1

[frank bliss <frank@blissnet.com>]

The actual strain of modern influenza you are all referring to is in  
fact H5N1 not H1N5.  Maybe it was the later back in the Mesozoic and  
has evolved since ;-)

Pandemic might have done pretty well because of the bad habit  
predators have of not properly cooking their food.  Any viral  
component of meat would have gotten around pretty easily.  Flying  
meat eaters with or without feathers could have given the bug legs to  
get across oceans.  I suspect that disease was just one of the nails  
in the coffin of non-avian dinos. Especially when the cold nuclear  
night set in and immune systems were lowered around the globe.

Frank (Rooster) Bliss
MS Biostratigraphy
Weston, Wyoming
www.cattleranch.org


On May 12, 2006, at 10:41 PM, Michael Mortimer wrote:

> Does the current strain even kill ratites?  That would be the group  
> to look into before extending the search to crocodilians.
>
> Mickey Mortimer
>
>
> > From: Phil Bigelow <bigelowp@juno.com>
> > Reply-To: bigelowp@juno.com
> > To: dinosaur@usc.edu
> > Subject: H1N5 (and Bakker's virus extinction hypothesis)
> > Date: Fri, 12 May 2006 10:56:44 +0000 (pd)
> >
> >
> > http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2006-05-11-bird-flu-fears_x.htm
> >
> > As I follow the H1N5 stories over the last couple years, I keep  
> > thinking
> > back to Bakker's "viral" mass extinction hypothesis for non-avian
> > dinosaurs.
> >
> > Although this particular strain of bird flu is deadly to birds, it is
> > only deadly to certain species.  Other avian species seem to only  
> > play
> > the role of unaffected carriers.  And even though certain bird  
> > species
> > have very high mortality rates, we are not seeing entire species  
> > on the
> > brink of extinction because of H1N5.
> >
> > The closest living relatives of Neoaves are the crocs, gators, and
> > caimans.  Does H1N5 infect and kill these taxa too? (Cladistic  
> > bracketing
> > comes into effect here.  Would a paleovirus that kills _T. rex_es  
> > also be
> > deadly to _Pachycephalosaurus_es..eses?).
> >
> > Although the spread of H1N5 may be a poor model to test Bakker's
> > extinction hypothesis, it seems to be the best real-world model we
> > currently have.  And as far as I can tell, this bird pandemic  
> > shows no
> > evidence of being catastrophic to tweeters.
> >
> > What elements are present in Bakker's hypothesis that are missing  
> > in the
> > H1N5 scenario?
> >
> > <pb>
> > --