A recent fossil find fills in a glaring prehistoric bird gap. The Jurassic period claims Archaeopteryx (sometimes called adeinonychosaurian dinosaur), which, despite their feathered wings, appear more dinosaur like. Meanwhile, most Cretaceous avian progenitors appear more birdlike, with short tails ending in a compound bone called a pygostyle.
A team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences report in the journal Nature found a specimen that fits between those proto birds. This finding suggests that the creatures we know as birds — or at least winged creatures that were more bird than dino — emerged 20 million years earlier than previously thought.
