Cenozoic birds and reptiles The Cenozoic (also Cainozoic or ...
Cenozoic birds and reptiles The Cenozoic (also Cainozoic or ...
Cenozoic birds and reptiles The Cenozoic (also Cainozoic or ...
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Source: http://www.paleocene.com/paleocene_photographs.html<br />
This is one of the diatrymas, <strong>birds</strong> which stood over two metres tall, <strong>and</strong> had unusually<br />
large skulls in prop<strong>or</strong>tion to their bodies (nearly 50 cm long, including a beak over 20 cm<br />
long.) <strong>The</strong>y weighed about 100 kg. Diatrymas bear a superficial resemblance to ph<strong>or</strong>usrhacids<br />
(previous image), but there is not a close relationship. <strong>The</strong>re has been some debate about<br />
whether diatrymas were carniv<strong>or</strong>es <strong>or</strong> herbiv<strong>or</strong>es, using their large beaks f<strong>or</strong> cracking nuts<br />
<strong>and</strong> large seeds much as parrots do today. Lawrence Wittmer <strong>and</strong> Kenneth Rose however<br />
concluded from an analysis of the biomechanics of the jaw in 1991 that the <strong>birds</strong> were<br />
carniv<strong>or</strong>ous, hunting <strong>and</strong> eating small mammals.<br />
Source: <br />
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd138/subzero9285/Titaniswallericlawh<strong>and</strong>edgoodrecon.jpg<br />
<br />
Note the ‘h<strong>and</strong>s’. Some reconstructions of certain terr<strong>or</strong> <strong>birds</strong>, like B. burmeisteri above, <br />
have endowed them with these appendages. We just don’t know f<strong>or</strong> sure.
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