ANATOMY OF BIRDS
GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION
MIGRATIONS OF BIRDS
CLASSIFICATION OF BIRDS
LIZARD-TAILED BIRD
AMERICAN TOOTHED-BIRDS
THE OSTRICHES
THE RHEAS
EMEUS AND CASSOWARIES
THE TINAMOUS
THE KIWIS
THE PENGUINS
LOONS AND GREBES
ALBATROSSES & PETRELS
STORK-LIKE BIRDS
GOOSE-LIKE BIRDS
FALCON-LIKE BIRDS
FOWL-LIKE BIRDS
CRANE-LIKE BIRDS
PLOVER-LIKE BIRDS
CUCKOO-LIKE BIRDS
THE ROLLER-LIKE BIRDS
SPARROW-LIKE BIRDS
Birds and Birding's Guide to:
Watching THE Archaeopteryx, OR LIZARD-TAILED BIRD
Anatomy, Size, etc
The Lizard-tailed bird was apparently about the size of our common Crow, being nearly eighteen inches in length. It had apparently a long, narrow body, while the head was small, pyramidal, nearly fiat on top, and provided with large openings for the eyes. The upper jaw, and probably the lower as well, was provided with numerous teeth, which appear to have been set in a groove. There was no beak, for the teeth extended to the very tip of the jaw.
The backbone consisted of some fifty biconcave vertebrae, of which number ten or eleven are regarded as belonging to the neck, a less number than is known in any modern bird, the lowest number being thirteen. In place of the short, usually solid bones of the tail found in present birds, Archaopteryx had a long, slender tail of about twenty free bones exactly as in many reptiles. Certain of these bones, perhaps each of them, supported a pair of long tail feathers. These feathers at present lie at an angle of about thirty degrees to the bones of the tail, and as they are pretty closely matted together, it is difficult to determine the exact number, some students placing them at twenty pairs, and others, as Gadow, as low as twelve pairs; the truth perhaps lies somewhere between these extremes. Present knowledge does not permit a positive assertion that the tail could be raised or depressed at will, or the pairs of feathers spread or closed, though both conditions might readily have been possible, for a very small tendon would have been ample provision for the manipulation of these parts without any trace of its presence appearing on the bones.
Archaopteryx had four toes, and the whole leg and foot appeared very much like those of an ordinary perching bird, except that the tibia and fibula were distinct, as in most reptiles. The anterior limbs, however, are very curiously modified.
The wings were rather short and rounded very much as in the common fowl, but unlike all known birds there were three long, slender fingers on each wing, each of which was armed w7ith a hooked, sharp-edged claw. There were also relatively large flight feathers, the apparent number being seventeen in each wing, six or seven of which were primaries and the rest secondaries, and, it may be added, no other bird has so few primaries. In addition to the quills there was at least one row of wing-coverts.
The sternum, or breast-bone, is obscurely preserved and is more or less in doubt, some observers claiming that it is not only present but possesses a well-defined keel, while others declare that, although much has been written about it, nothing is absolutely known. A definite knowledge of this bone would be of great assistance in interpreting the probable habits of its owner. The three bones of the pelvis, as in most reptiles, are perfectly distinct from one another, and a further decidedly reptilian character is found in the absence of the hooklike processes of the ribs.
The covering of the body, aside from the wing and tail feathers, has been the subject of much speculation. From the fact that the feathers of tail and wings are preserved with such remarkable fidelity, it is argued that, had there been a general feather covering, some definite trace of it would remain. As it is, the only positive contour feathering seems to be confined to the leg, producing apparently a”booted”condition similar to that observed in the Falcons.
There is also some slight evidence of the presence of a”ruff”about the base of the neck, as in the Condor, while the remainder of the body was apparently naked, or possibly covered with down or small feathers which disappeared during the decay which preceded the entombment. The contention advanced by certain writers that the body, aside from the feathering mentioned above, was covered with scales is not only absolutely unsupported by fact, but is in the highest degree improbable.
The length of time that must have intervened in evolving the very perfect wing and tail feathers of Archaopteryx from reptilian scales, if that is whence they came, would undoubtedly have been ample for the production of some sort of a feather covering for the remainder of the body.
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