Re: Tiny feathered dino may have glided

On 10/25/24 8:10 PM, JTEM wrote:

  John Harshman wrote:
 

That's actually an interesting point. But what are these early, secondarily flightless birds? Are you referring to oviraptorosaurs, deinonychosaurs, and such? Greg Paul's ideas? What's the evidence that they had flying ancestors?

 Just Googled "earliest secondarily flightless bird."
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patagopteryx

Sorry, but Patagopteryx is not evidence for your claims. It's a flightless bird all right, but we know that because it's embedded within the group closest to modern birds and thus evolutionarily quite distant from the origin of flight. You might as well point to a kiwi.
If there's a secondarily flightless theropod that supports your claim it would have to be something much closer to the origin of flight, which is why I mentioned oviraptorosaurs and deinonychosaurs. You should try Greg Paul's book Dinosaurs of the Air.