Back from the Dead the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker

The last known individual of Campephilus principalis perished in 1944. On a recent kayaking trip in Eastern Arkansas Gene Sparling spotted a bird which he identified as a male Ivory-Billed Woodpecker, additional sightings were made a few days later by an experienced ornithologists from Corell University. A brief four second video was taken of a fleeing bird, identified as a Ivory-Billed Woodpecker. Reminiscent of Bigfoot footage, the bird in the video is blurred and pixilated owing to rapid motion, slow shutter speed, video interlacing artifacts, and the bird's distance. Images from the video can be seen at Science Magazine's Website. I am hopeful that the species is back from extinction.

Two new temnospondyl amphibians from Africa

Two new amphibians from the Late Permain Moradi Formation of Niger were described this week in the journal Nature. The two specimens are new to science and seem to indicate a unique fauna for central West Africa during the Late Permain. The fossils differ in relationship to other Late Permain reptiles from South Africa, suggesting an ecological difference between the two areas. The Moradi Formation has previously produced the Captorhinid Moradisaurus and Pareiasaurid Bunostegia, both anapsid reptiles.



Sidor, C. A., O'Keefe F. R., Damiani, R., Steyer, J. S., Smith R. M. H., Larsson, H., Sereno, P. C., Ide, O. and Maga, A. Permian tetrapods from the Sahara show climate-controlled endemism in Pangaea. Nature 434, 886-889 (14 April.

Have nothing to do this summer?

Paleontological field expeditions are being lead by the Queensland Museum this summer in Australia. For more information.

Jurassic Digging Mammal

	Restoration of Fruitafossor windscheffeli a newly discovered fossorial mammal showing forelimb and manual features for scratch digging and a dentition specialized for feeding on termites, other insects, and supplemented with plants. The remarkable specimen was discovered in the Late Jurassic Morrison Formation in Western Colorado, near the town of Fruita.
Luo, Z. and Wible, J.R. 2005. A late Jurassic digging mammal and early mammalian diversification. Science, 308(5718),103-107, 1 April 2005 doi:10.1126/science.1108875.

Elephant Shrews in North America

	There is a mild disagreement between vertebrate paleontologists and molecular biologists over the relationships of various orders of mammals. One of the less publized debates centers around the placement of an obscure order Macroscelidea (Elephant Shrews).
Most molecular phylogenies place Macroscelidea in a Africa clade, called Afrotheria, which includes other mammal orders believed to have originated from Africa (Hyracoidea, Proboscidea). In 1986 the paleontologists J.J. Hartenberger proposed a different origin for Elephant Shrews from an family of Paleocene/Eocene fossil mammals from North America/Europe called Hyopsodontids. His idea was further vindicated by the later discovery in 1991 of early elephant shrew dentitions from Egypt that also showed similar relationships. However, most of these comparisons were made using just teeth. In 1999, I started my own study on the relationship of elephant shrews and hyopsodontids using postcranial information from a rather complete skeleton of Hyopsodus, and came to a more skeptical conclusion. A recently published article in Nature last week, featured postcranial elements of Aphelicus and Haplomylus (two other hyopsodontids) and concluded a North American origin for Elephant Shrews. As a side note the postcranial elements of both taxa show strong similarities, refuting claims that Aphelicus is not a hyopsodontid. Futhermore Haplomylus shows more cursorial adaptations than I would have thought. Hinting at a possible Artiodactyla relationship, first proposed by Ken Rose.
Zack, S.P., Penkrot, T.A., Bloch, J.I. and Rose, K.. 2005. Affinities of 'hyopsodontids' to elephant shrews and a Holarctic origin of Afrotheria. Nature 434, 497-501 (24 March 2005); doi:10.1038/nature03351.