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Early Jurassic theropod from Wales

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    #2
    Linnaeus
    Registered Users Posts: 218 ✭✭Linnaeus


    Dinosaurs of a feather...Or proto-feathers! Prehistoric creatures are hardly ever depicted with smooth naked skin or scales anymore. When I was a child, the raptors, Coelophysis, Ornithomimus and the rest appeared in picture books as sleek, completely plumeless and wingless creatures. Nowadays, everything from Deinonychus to T-Rex ancestors is being provided with feathers! Even this new discovery from Wales, whose so-called "proto-feathers" seem more like stiff hairs or spiky growths in the illustration. I'm all for the theory that certain theropods were the direct ancestors of birds...But some palaeontologists are just getting carried away. Soon we'll be asked to believe in feathered Triceratopses and swiftly flying Tyrannosaurs.:confused:

    Sure, feathers or feather-like pinnacles might have developed for different purposes at different moments of evolution: e.g., for insulation or courting displays. But the unfortunate trend today is to interpret every little bit of fluff or dino-fuzz as ancestral to the development of flight.


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