Birds had to relearn flight after meteor wiped out dinosaurs

[Judi Lynn]

Fossil records suggest only flightless birds survived when T rex was wiped off the Earth

Hannah Devlin and agencies
@hannahdev
Thu 24 May 2018 12.58 EDT

Birds had to rediscover flight after the meteor strike that killed off the dinosaurs, scientists say.

The cataclysm 66m years ago not only wiped out Tyrannosaurus rex and ground-dwelling dinosaur species, but also flying birds, a detailed survey of the fossil record suggests.

As forests burned around the world, the only birds to survive were flightless emu-like species that lived on the ground.

“Looking at the fossil record, at plants and birds, there are multiple lines of evidence suggesting that the forest canopies collapsed,” said Regan Dunn, a member of the team from the Field Museum in Chicago, US. “Perching birds went extinct because there were no more perches.”

More:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/24/birds-had-to-relearn-flight-after-meteor-that-wiped-out-dinosaurs

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

1. Very Very Cool.

Good stuff. TY.