Texas Fossils Strengthen Link Between Dinosaurs and Birds

Fossil bones 225 million years old found entombed in Texas mudstone have been identified as remains of the oldest known birds, strengthening the evolutionary link between dinosaurs and birds, a scientist reported Wednesday.

Texas Tech University paleontologist Sankar Chatterjee said the crow-sized birds, with powerful hind legs and a tail resembling those of a tiny dinosaur, are 75 million years older than the Bavarian bird-reptile previously considered to be the earliest forerunner of today’s birds.

He said the discovery indicates that early birds were much more widely distributed around the world than generally believed before the late Cretaceous period, 70 million to 135 million years ago, when birds began to flourish worldwide.

The find was reported by the National Geographic Society, which has supported the research of Chatterjee and his students for six years.

Chatterjee said in a telephone interview from his lab in Lubbock, Tex., that the fossils were found two years ago by students using jack hammers to break up the mudstone in a quarry near Post, Tex. He and his students thought they were bones from baby dinosaurs and stored them away.

He said it was during the last six months that he realized the fossils were from a previously unknown creature. Chatterjee calls the bird Protoavis for ancestral bird.

Most of the fossils found so far belong to two birds, an adult and a juvenile, but Chatterjee said more bone fragments are being found now that he and his students know what to look for.

The creature previously believed to be the oldest forerunner of birds is called Archaeopteryx, a 150-million-year-old animal that was three-fourths reptile and one-fourth bird. It was found in 1861 in a limestone quarry in Bavaria and is now on exhibit in the British Museum in London.