Not elder law: World’s oldest bird fossils found in China
Five beautifully preserved headless fossil skeletons discovered inChina suggest modern birds evolved from aquatic duck-like ancestors.The creatures, which shared the planet with dinosaurs 110m years ago,are the oldest modern bird fossils ever found. The finds were made byUS and Chinese researchers in the north-western Gansu province .
Thespecies, named Gansus yumenensis after the region and the nearby cityof Yumen, was previously known only from a fossil leg found in 1983.Hai-Lu You at the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences in Beijingsaid that the fine sediment the finds had been covered with by the lakein which the birds died explained the “very, very beautifulpreservation”. He added: “Soft tissues cannot be preserved normally,but a lake environment, compared to a river, is kind of quiet.”Researchers could see the carbonised remains of feathers and webbingbetween the birds’ toes.
And in more “world’s oldest news”, the world’s oldest spider has been found trapped in amber–in a museum specimin located in Spain. Read all about it at http://english.pravda.ru/news/world/15-06-2006/82053-spider-0