birds

[darylj]

Ok.. another question.
Birds a re dinosaurs... we accept that as fact now.
After the cretaceous extinction – as far as we know, all terrestrial dinosaurs disappeared.

Were there any flightless bird species around during the cretaceous? (like non dino flightless birds e.g ratites, sea birds etc)
If so did any of these survive past the cretaceous extinction?

Also, only a few million years after the extinction the terror birds appear.
Do we have any clear evidence that terror birds came from  the line – dino, feathered dino, flying bird, flightless bird?
What im getting at is – is it possible (and I think im being hopeful here) that it went – dino, feathered dino, terror bird?

I mean a terror bird is just a toothless, small tailed dino right? 

Just wondered peoples thoughts

[ZoPteryx]

As far as we can tell all flightless birds in the late Cretaceous died out along with the non-avian dinos.  Examples include Hesperornis and some turkey-sized bird from Europe who's name escapes me.  Plenty of flyng birds died out as well, including the very successful enantiornithes.

The terror birds are "true birds", so to speak.  There closest living relatives are thought to be the Seriema birds of South America.

[SBell]

Ok.. another question.
Birds a re dinosaurs... we accept that as fact now.
After the cretaceous extinction – as far as we know, all terrestrial dinosaurs disappeared.

Were there any flightless bird species around during the cretaceous? (like non dino flightless birds e.g ratites, sea birds etc)
If so did any of these survive past the cretaceous extinction?

Also, only a few million years after the extinction the terror birds appear.
Do we have any clear evidence that terror birds came from  the line – dino, feathered dino, flying bird, flightless bird?
What im getting at is – is it possible (and I think im being hopeful here) that it went – dino, feathered dino, terror bird?

I mean a terror bird is just a toothless, small tailed dino right? 

Just wondered peoples thoughts

No. Gastornis and other terror birds are true birds. The closest dinosaur relatives were clearly not.  They would have evolved from some of the small birds that survived the K/Pg.  But the hypothesis was proposed many years before, and was determined to be incorrect.