Natural History Wanderings

 Archaeopteryx may have just lost its status as the oldest bird. Fossils found  in northeastern China have discovered a feathered chicken-sized creature known as Aurornis xui. Aurornis xui  is 160 million years old and about 10 million years than Archaeopteryx.

Vertebrate paleontologist, Andrea Cau, at the Museo Geologico Giovanni Capellini in Italy,  who coauthored the original article about the discovery in the journal Nature, says. “It looked like a ground bird, but with a long tail, clawed hands and toothed jaws.”

There is some controversy about Aurornis xui‘ s status is the oldest bird is not without controversy. Aurornis xui. Luis Chiappe, a vertebrate paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles, who was not involved with the paper states “You’re looking at an animal that is either a very primitive bird or something very closely related to birds,” “I tend to think that it’s not a bird, but that it’s one of those true very close ancestors of bird.”  He also claims that it is possible the fossil may have been altered as he states that as many as 80% of the fossils in Chinese museums are believed to be artificially “enhanced”.

Read more at the following three articles which are the sources for this post:

New Discovery Knocks ‘Oldest Bird’ Off Its Perch : The Two-Way : NPR.
Scientists find oldest feathered dinosaur yet: Sorry, Archaeopteryx – latimes.com.
A Jurassic avialan dinosaur from China resolves the early phylogenetic history of birds : Nature : Nature Publishing Group.