Ostrich dinosaurs ... with wings!

[s.foulkes]

seeing is not always the only way we can believe in something. I know dinosaurs pretty well and i have the art to back it up but i will say that if world renoun paleontologist tell me those are feathers then those are feathers, ! None of you have seen me sculpt in person but i tell you i do ,does that mean that you wont believe me until you see me sculpt them in person? i dont jump on band wagons and assign peticular  new evidence found on one fossil  to every species i wanted to have it. What i will say is that fossil evidence of feathers looks like this but because of the fine type of sediment its preserved in ,its not as defined as say in Archaeopteryx finds. IF you can only go by what you see then believe the pros when they say your looking at feathers. times are a changin. i know i will be goin with the flow.

[stoneage]

I don't see any feathers either. In Gryp article it said:  "But the preservation of details in the coarse sandstone fossil is poor, says palaeontologist Thomas Holtz of the University of Maryland in College Park. He wants to see better-preserved specimens to be sure what type of feather structures were on the ornithomimids' arms."  In other words this fossil is so bad he can't even tell what kind of feather structure he is looking at.  If seeing is believing, I need to see something more convincing.

Dr. Holtz is not denying presence of feathers.  He is just unsure as to whether or not they are veined feathers specifically.   

That wasn't my point about mammals.  Why do we reconstruct Smilodon with fur?  It isn't known from any fossil that has direct evidence of fur.  But we do know its closely related to modern cats which do have fur.  Coelurosaurs should be treated the same with birds.

We construct Smilodon with fur because it's skin and tufts of hair have been found in the La Brea Tar Pits.  It lived only 10,000 years ago, when many of todays modern animals also existed.  It's relative the Clouded Leopard has hair.
In the article they talk about branching feathers, but I can't tell how they can tell that from this.  Dr. Holtz couldn't do it.  Also in the video they talked about protofeathers which if you remember Dinoguy 2 said "There's no such thing as "protofeathers". http://www.springerlink.com/content/u71014417j3214j0/
Also this fossil was found in sandstone, which is a material in which feathers have never been found before.  Some people have been known to see Jesus in a cornflake.

[stoneage]

Does this mean that Ornithomimus could fly?

Doesn't look like feathers to me either, but then again I'm not a paleontologist, nor do I claim to be.

No it was too heavy. It weighed 370 pounds.

[Gwangi]

We construct Smilodon with fur because it's skin and tufts of hair have been found in the La Brea Tar Pits.  It lived only 10,000 years ago, when many of todays modern animals also existed.  It's relative the Clouded Leopard has hair.

Clouded leopards belong to the sub-family pantherinae while the Smilodon belongs to the machairodontinae sub-family. It is as closely related to a Clouded leopard as it is to a tiger or lion. Regardless of that however the point it still valid, you could substitute any extinct mammal for the Smilodon for which there is no direct evidence of hair but it being a mammal would suggest it had them. There is no reason to think ornithomimids did not have feathers even if this discovery was never made. Give me one if you have it.

Also this fossil was found in sandstone, which is a material in which feathers have never been found before. 

So? Dinosaurs never existed before they were found either right? Should we dismiss this because sandstone is a material in which feathers have never been found?

Some people have been known to see Jesus in a cornflake.

Did you even think about this remark before typing it? How does some random backwoods local who opened up a box of cereal and thinks Jesus is on a cornflake compare to an educated member of the scientific community who has written a peer reviewed paper on a scientific discovery? If you feel a statement like that is accurate why bother doing science at all? Until you or someone else offers up compelling, reasoned evidence for your position there is really nothing else to be said, I'm going to side with the experts as this point in time.

[Balaur]

HOLY CRAP! NORTH AMERICAN FEATHERED DINOSAUR! ORNITHOMIMIDS WITH WINGS! THIS PLANET IS NOW A HAPPIER PLACE. ANd it never made the news.  And that's why I responded until now.

[Gryphoceratops]

I don't see any feathers either. In Gryp article it said:  "But the preservation of details in the coarse sandstone fossil is poor, says palaeontologist Thomas Holtz of the University of Maryland in College Park. He wants to see better-preserved specimens to be sure what type of feather structures were on the ornithomimids' arms."  In other words this fossil is so bad he can't even tell what kind of feather structure he is looking at.  If seeing is believing, I need to see something more convincing.

Dr. Holtz is not denying presence of feathers.  He is just unsure as to whether or not they are veined feathers specifically.   

That wasn't my point about mammals.  Why do we reconstruct Smilodon with fur?  It isn't known from any fossil that has direct evidence of fur.  But we do know its closely related to modern cats which do have fur.  Coelurosaurs should be treated the same with birds.

We construct Smilodon with fur because it's skin and tufts of hair have been found in the La Brea Tar Pits.  It lived only 10,000 years ago, when many of todays modern animals also existed.  It's relative the Clouded Leopard has hair.
In the article they talk about branching feathers, but I can't tell how they can tell that from this.  Dr. Holtz couldn't do it.  Also in the video they talked about protofeathers which if you remember Dinoguy 2 said "There's no such thing as "protofeathers". http://www.springerlink.com/content/u71014417j3214j0/
Also this fossil was found in sandstone, which is a material in which feathers have never been found before.  Some people have been known to see Jesus in a cornflake.

Are u sure they were tufts of hair and not just smudges of stuff that looks like hair?  You can accept that but not feathers on a dinosaur. 

I hate to pull this card I really do but I know Dr. Holtz.  I really don't think he is against feathers on this specimen.  He was simply saying that he is unsure as to whether they are specifically veined feathers like those you find on a flying bird.  At the very least they were most definitely more basal-type feathers like the ones you find on other fossil feathered dinosaurs like sinosauropteryx...but then again you probably don't accept them as being feathered either so why should I even bother. 

The jesus in a cornflake remark ... Gwangi addressed that just fine I think. 

[wings]

Do you have access to the paper?  I couldn't find it for free.

There you go (http://www.2shared.com/document/oNoINZs5/Science-2012-Zelenitsky-510-4.html).

[Seijun]

No such thing as protofeathers?
I don't know, I think in order for feathers to have evolved, one would have needed protofeathers at some point (i.e - a feather that has yet to develop the complexity seen in the feathers of modern flighted birds).

[wings]

No such thing as protofeathers?
I don't know, I think in order for feathers to have evolved, one would have needed protofeathers at some point (i.e - a feather that has yet to develop the complexity seen in the feathers of modern flighted birds).

I think it is better to say that we don't have any "protofeather" samples yet because as you can see from this Sinosauropteryx specimen (http://qilong.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/sinosauropteryx-feather-close-up-dinosaur-color_12397_600x450.jpg), it definitely has open-vaned pennaceous feathers, even though that this animal has long been considered to have "protofeathers". We will just have to wait and see.

On a side note, when you look at this diagram from Foth's (2012) paper (http://qilong.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/wsb_488x500_541968_388075204570227_100310700013347_1121699_1509394593_n.jpg) what you will notice is that feathers overlapping and when compressed, all you could possibly see are the rachises and the rest of the feather (like the barbs) would simply look like fuzzy filamentous structure and lack definition. Could this be the case for these filamentous structure found on these Ornithomimuses? Perhaps. As for the evidence of vaned feathers that was referring to the adult animal which shows marking of the hollow shafts (calamus) of the feathers on their arms. To explain these marking, maybe you can think of them as straws, if you look at one of the ends you will see the hollow out circular shape and if you cut the straw in an angle (like how the feather shafts growing in an angle to the arm bones) what you will find is the shape of an ellipse (in this case the U-shaped and hook shaped marking found on the arm bones). Therefore whatever integument is growing on the arm of these adult animals have a definitive hollow shaft (could still be quill like in structure and without vane, kind of like the stage 1 type feather). However, this kind of structure is not found on the juveniles, probably an indication of these "wings" (if they did form a wing-like structure) are used as courtship display device rather than function wings for flight.

[Dinoguy2]

I don't see any feathers either. In Gryp article it said:  "But the preservation of details in the coarse sandstone fossil is poor, says palaeontologist Thomas Holtz of the University of Maryland in College Park. He wants to see better-preserved specimens to be sure what type of feather structures were on the ornithomimids' arms."  In other words this fossil is so bad he can't even tell what kind of feather structure he is looking at.  If seeing is believing, I need to see something more convincing.

Dr. Holtz is not denying presence of feathers.  He is just unsure as to whether or not they are veined feathers specifically.   

That wasn't my point about mammals.  Why do we reconstruct Smilodon with fur?  It isn't known from any fossil that has direct evidence of fur.  But we do know its closely related to modern cats which do have fur.  Coelurosaurs should be treated the same with birds.

We construct Smilodon with fur because it's skin and tufts of hair have been found in the La Brea Tar Pits.

Do you have a source for that? I've never heard of any Smilodon soft tissue being recovered from La Brea.

It lived only 10,000 years ago, when many of todays modern animals also existed. 

What does that have to o with whether or not it had fur?

It's relative the Clouded Leopard has hair.

That's an argument from phyogenetic bracketing!

In the article they talk about branching feathers, but I can't tell how they can tell that from this.

Due to the presence of quill knobs, the branching feathers are inferred. No known animal has non-branching quills on the unla, so while possible, this would be a more complicated and unjustified explanation.

Also in the video they talked about protofeathers which if you remember Dinoguy 2 said "There's no such thing as "protofeathers".

If you're going to quote mine me out of context, none of your arguments should be trusted by anyone. There is no evidence of protofeathers in the fossil record because poor preservation makes TRUE DOWN feathers *look* like protofeathers. Based on this fossil Ornithomimus had Stage 3 down feathers, not "protofeathers." There's nothing "pro to" about them, they looks entirely consistent with preservation of down in other dinosaurs.

Also this fossil was found in sandstone, which is a material in which feathers have never been found before.

Feathers were never found in limestone until the 1860s. There's a first time for everything. People who work with these type of fossils admit that they probably destroyed previous evidence of feathers because the assumed it could not be preserved. 

Some people have been known to see Jesus in a cornflake.

Yup, trained paleontologists and borderline crazy nutjobs use the same level of logical reasoning. I'm surprised people with this mindset believe in dinosaurs at all. If you have an alternate explanation for the feathers in Ornithomimus, I'm sure Larry Martin will be along to support you shortly. The rest of the scientific world will continue to use logic and carefully measured skepticism rather than blind incredulity govern our thinking process.

[wings]

In the article they talk about branching feathers, but I can't tell how they can tell that from this.

Due to the presence of quill knobs, the branching feathers are inferred. No known animal has non-branching quills on the unla, so while possible, this would be a more complicated and unjustified explanation.

I didn't realize there are quill knobs preserved, I was under the impression that what they have are some kind of markings "etched" on the lower arm bones but no quill knobs identified (I've read the paper as well and also seen this comment on the theropod database blog (http://theropoddatabase.blogspot.com.au/2012/10/did-dromiceiomimus-really-have-long.html) where Mickey has the following comment "...This is based on black marks on the radius and ulna which trend posterodistally to distally, and sometimes are U- or hook-shaped as if they had hollow centers.  Now maybe these are feather remains, though I don't know of any other theropod which has preserved feathers this way.  Yet as Mcfeeters noted on the DML, they only show the shaft, not any vane.  Couldn't these just be stage 1 feathers, quills, etc.?..."). Are there any published photos of these quill knobs that you are talking about?

[Yutyrannus]

I agree with Gryphoceratops on this one.
Also look at this cool picture!

[Dinoguy2]

In the article they talk about branching feathers, but I can't tell how they can tell that from this.

Due to the presence of quill knobs, the branching feathers are inferred. No known animal has non-branching quills on the unla, so while possible, this would be a more complicated and unjustified explanation.

I didn't realize there are quill knobs preserved, I was under the impression that what they have are some kind of markings "etched" on the lower arm bones but no quill knobs identified (I've read the paper as well and also seen this comment on the theropod database blog (http://theropoddatabase.blogspot.com.au/2012/10/did-dromiceiomimus-really-have-long.html) where Mickey has the following comment "...This is based on black marks on the radius and ulna which trend posterodistally to distally, and sometimes are U- or hook-shaped as if they had hollow centers.  Now maybe these are feather remains, though I don't know of any other theropod which has preserved feathers this way.  Yet as Mcfeeters noted on the DML, they only show the shaft, not any vane.  Couldn't these just be stage 1 feathers, quills, etc.?..."). Are there any published photos of these quill knobs that you are talking about?

I was using quill knob in the loosest possible sense--they're not actual ulnar papillae as you note. So you answered you own question--the markings which likely represent the bases of rawhides are the evidence that they had rachides, unless you have a simpler explanation for what those markings are.

(Note that even many, if not most, modern birds do not have actual bony quill knobs associated with their ulnar rachides).

As for Mortimar's "Couldn't these just be stage 1 feathers, quills, etc.?..." Yes, it's possible, but a) they'd still be feathers and b) no known animal has long stage 1 quills arranged along the arm like that, which would make ornithomimids extremely unique in morphology. It's simpler to assume they had normal wings than some kind of weird array of barb-free rachides. I personally question the assumption that these were vaned feathers, as there's no evidence for that. But they're probably at least Stage 3. I equal question reconstruction of the supposed quill knobs for Concavenator as simple but thick quills, like a feather that lost its vane. Other stage 1 feathers are more hair-like, not quill-like, and aren't arranged along the arm in a planar fashion. Some artists seem to be suffering from JP3 raptor syndrome, inventing brand new feather types because they're unfamiliar with the way feathers actually develop.

[wings]

Ah, I see. I thought I might have misread the paper and there was actual quill knobs on the specimen. I wasn't questioning what these markings are (attachment sites for the calami which could be coverts or secondaries, as in my earlier posts), and normally "quill knobs" are referring to the bony projections on the posterior margin of the ulna as attachment points for the secondaries and that was the only reason I asked.

Yeah, quill knobs are weird some times they could even be present or absent within a single species (as in the Sparrowhawk example from Yalden's paper, he has four skeletons of Sparrowhawk, somehow three of them have these quill knobs while one has none). I would like to see that they have branched stage 3 feathers (like you said probably not interlocking) as well because it would seen very usual to have the adult animal developing a more "basal" form of feather than the juveniles. As for Mickey's comment on the affinity of these "markings", I've only brought it up just as an unlikely but possible (probably currently still acceptable) alternative.