HOME | DD

Description
Copyright statement: I do not own this image, and am not licensed to release it for download or commercial use. Please respect that neither are you.

A series of illustrations for a forthcoming book presenting the evolution of the avian wing planform.

This illustration probably reflects Archaeopteryx lithographica in the small islands that once presented all that was Europe from the Early Jurassic into the early Paleogene. With vegetation low, finding good elevation would have required some hunting, and it is possible these little urvogels would have made territory out of these vantage points. Keeping them is another thing.

WAIR (wing-assisted incline running) is a model that has been controversial in the origins of birds, proposed by Ken Dial and others to suggest that birds would have flapped their wings as they ran up inclines to help give them additional lift. Lately, some doubt on the quality of this model, with its late appearance used only in ground foraging birds but not more basal living birds, and the use of an advanced, full-vertical start of the wing stroke, makes it difficult to assess the utility of WAIR when it comes to the evolution, rather than the derivation, of flight.

Part 1: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…
Part 2: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…
Part 3: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…
Part 4: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…

Description
Copyright statement: I do not own this image, and am not licensed to release it for download or commercial use. Please respect that neither are you.

A series of illustrations for a forthcoming book presenting the evolution of the avian wing planform.

This illustration probably reflects Archaeopteryx lithographica in the small islands that once presented all that was Europe from the Early Jurassic into the early Paleogene. With vegetation low, finding good elevation would have required some hunting, and it is possible these little urvogels would have made territory out of these vantage points. Keeping them is another thing.

WAIR (wing-assisted incline running) is a model that has been controversial in the origins of birds, proposed by Ken Dial and others to suggest that birds would have flapped their wings as they ran up inclines to help give them additional lift. Lately, some doubt on the quality of this model, with its late appearance used only in ground foraging birds but not more basal living birds, and the use of an advanced, full-vertical start of the wing stroke, makes it difficult to assess the utility of WAIR when it comes to the evolution, rather than the derivation, of flight.

Part 1: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…
Part 2: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…
Part 3: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…
Part 4: qilong.deviantart.com/art/Evol…