Auf Widersehen Archaeopteryx, Nǐ hǎo Aurornis xui!

Birds have for a long time been recognized a group of Theropod Dinosaur descendants. The most famous of these 'Dino-Birds' is Archaeopteryx. Archaeopteryx has often been accepted by pop culture as the first bird dating to around 150 million years ago. Fossils of Archaeopteryx have been found at Solnhofen in Germany exquisitely preserved in the sandstone found there. But it looks like the earlier bird is about to get the worm. Scientists this week announced the discovery of a new Dino bird species Aurornis xui. Found in the Jurassic rocks of Liaoning province, China. Scientists bought the specimen form a local fossil dealer who presumed it was another fossil he could sell on the market. At first scientists questioned how genuine the specimen was, but researchers working on the piece claim that it is very unlikely to be a forgery. Aurornis is described as being about the size of a pheasant with limbs similar to Archaeopteryx. But unlike Archaeopteryx it completely lacked any larger feathers and possessed short, downy feathers suggesting that it couldn't fly. Aurornis seems to be further down the bird lineage than Archaeopteryx and pre dates it by 15-10 million years. It is likely Aurornis climbed trees or ran very quickly along the ground. Aurornis xui means Xui's dawn beat. Referring to how the new species is thought to be the oldest bird fossil found. But claiming this title is far from easy. As with any prehistoric species we can be sure that it is the first of it's kind. Palaeontologist Paul Barret states "The new species is certainly an older member of the bird lineage than Archaeopteryx, and it's fair to call it a very primitive bird. But what you call a bird comes down to what you call a bird, and a lot of definitions depend on Archaeopteryx,"."This emphasises how grey the dividing line is between birds and dinosaurs. There's such a gradation in features between them that it's very difficult to tell them apart. It only takes relatively small changes in our knowledge of these to flip around some of the evolutionary relationships between them," So the relationship between Aurornis, Archaeopteryx and their Dinosaurian ancestors is very complicated and is subject to the latest discoveries. But it seems our feathered friends have been around for longer than we have previously thought.