fossils Archives - American Ornithological Society

04 August 2021

Ostrich evolution revealed: Fossil finds shed new light on the evolution of the African ratite

By Gerald Mayr, Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum in Frankfurt Linked paper: Extinct crane-like birds (Eogruidae and Ergilornithidae) from the Cenozoic of Central Asia are indeed ostrich precursors by Gerald Mayr & Nikita Zelenkov, Ornithology. Until now, the early evolutionary history of ostriches was largely unknown. Together with my colleague Nikita Zelenkov from …

(A) Schematic phylogenetic tree showing proposed position of Jacamatia luberonensis relative to extant and extinct taxa of Piciformes and relatives. (B) Artist’s view of J. luberonensis (watercolour painting © Anaïs Duhamel).

11 May 2020

AOS

A Tiny Fossil Reveals Part of the Complex History of Puffbirds and Jacamars in Europe

When the fragment of calcareous plate was unearthed in sunny southeastern France, there was a hint of the presence within it of small fossil bones.

photo showing many small fossil toe bones organized into compartments in a tray — The fossil toe bones of Golden and Bald eagles provide hints about how they adapted to Pleistocene megafauna extinctions. Photo by Oona Takano.

06 April 2020

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900 Tiny Toe Bones Tell a Story About Prehistoric Eagles

Oona Takano’s research focuses on how something big — Pleistocene megafauna extinctions — affected something very small: the toe bones of eagles.

a young woman dressed for the outdoors stands on a brown hillside — Researcher Grace Musser in the field.

02 December 2019

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What a Fossil Foot Can Teach Us About Ancient Relatives of Cranes

In ancient Chinese mythology, cranes were said to carry the souls of the dead to paradise.