Australia: The Land Where Time Began

A biography of the Australian continent 

This is the largest known Cretaceous bird, with a wingspan of almost 1 m, double the size of Archaeopteryx. It had long forelimbs, short hind limbs and the shortened tail ended in a pygostyle. It had protruding teeth in the upper jaw, but a well developed sternum was absent, indicating it hadn't reached the state of flight attained by modern birds. It is believed to have eaten hard food, such as seeds, because of the gastroliths in the region of the stomach seen in fossils. It is believed to have evolved to about the level of Confuciusornis, but with a large body, indicating that it had attained a sufficiently efficient flight mode to fly with a larger body.

Sources & Further reading

• Feathered Dinosaurs: the Origin of Birds, John Long and Peter Schouten, CSIRO Publishing

Links

• Peter Schouten
• Dinodata