Claw Clues
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| Photo: Stewart Gould |
University researchers have clipped the wings of the idea that the ancestors of modern birds were tree dwellers. Exhaustive work by PhD student, Chris Glen, and Associate Professor Mike Bennett, from UQ’s School of Biomedical Sciences, studying the claws of thousands of bird feet has concluded the dinosaur ancestors of modern birds were mostly ground foragers.
Mr Glen said though there were some birds that only foraged on the ground and those that only foraged in trees, there was actually an entire spectrum of birds that did both. “Interestingly, we have found a clear pattern that shows species that spend more time foraging in trees will have claws that are more curved as you track along this spectrum,” Mr Glen said. “The upshot being you can tell whether a bird species spends more time in trees or on the ground by seeing if they have more hooked claws (tree dwellers) or straight claws (ground foragers).”
The research compared the feet of modern birds with those from the fossil record of “fuzzy dinosaurs” and early birds, the most famous of those being the Archaeopteryx, to gain a better picture of how these animals developed. The research was published in the scientific journal, Current Biology.
