Genyornis newtoni right pes

Ah, after the millionth attempt I have been able to upload this thing! We had a hardcore thuderstorm that rattled the entire house. I think that it totally messed with the internet connection. Anyhow, down to business...

This sketch is from Rich and Vicker-Rich's Wildlife of Gondwana. This book has been my constant companion in libraries since I discovered it in Launceston College when I was in Grade 11. It has been invaluable to me because as a lowly student far away from palaeontology central in Sydney, I don't have ready access to specimens. The photography is sooo good! This is a sketch of the right foot of Genyornis newtoni. Here you can see the end point of the evolutionary trends of the dromornithids. I say end point because Genyornis was the last of its lineage, dying out some 26,000-6,000 years ago. Here you can see that the inner digit has been reduced and the increased size of the outer digit. Supposably these were adaptions to a more cursorial lifestyle as the rainforests that once blanketed Australia dried out. Unlike Dromornis stirtoni, Genyornis is more gracile and probably had a better ability to run fast. It also didn't have the massive bill that D. stirtoni.

Personally I believe that G. newtoni had a similar ecological niche to the living emu (Dromaius novaehollandiae) and fed on plants, seeds and probably invertebrates. This I believe a possibily because the emus that were comtemporaries of G. newtoni were smaller than the emus we see today. This could be due to the fact that the species competed with one another for the same resources meaning that the emus were denied of some food and suffered from a degree of stunted growth.

There are some intriguing tales from some Australian Aboriginal tribes that are suggestive of Genyornis newtoni or some other similar animal in the past. The Tjapwurong people of the Lancefield area of Victoria say that mirhirung paringmal or "Giant Emus" were living in the area when Volcanoes were active in the west. That suggests that they were around 6000 years ago at least. I also came across a legend that coud have come from the Kamilaroi People who inhabit the plains and slopes of north-west New South Wales. There is a place called the Boobera Lagoon which is thought to have once been the abode of Kurrea the rainbow serpent and his descentants are known as the Gowarkees or Gowargays, the "water emu spirits." These are also called "Giant Emus" and were said to have inhabit the swampy country near the dwelling of Baiame the All Father. These birds were black and had red legs. Could this be an ancient memory of Genyornis newtoni passed down the generations?

It would make sense if these were the birds in question. If they inhabited swamps and were more needy of water than emus, perhaps this is the reason why they did not survive to the present day.

Dromornithids, "Mihirungs" or "Thunderbirds"

When I came back to Tasmania after my wonderful time at Riversleigh smashing open limestone to get fossils, I decided that my new subject for the pen and paper would be Dromornis stirtoni. After I had drawn a pair of Thylacoleo carnifex scrapping of course. (They are not anatomically sound I know but I will get better at this.) So I pulled out Tom Rich and Pat Vickers-Rich's Wildlife of Gondwana book from the shelves of the Science Library in the University of Tasmania and sketched these dromornithid legs. I saw the skull on one of Micheal Archer's powerpoint slides as he gave a lecture in the relative cool of the evening on the warm open timber awning where we took our meals. Seeing that skull sparked my interest in Dromornis stirtoni once more. I made a quick sketch in the fleeting seconds he had it on the screen...


Here it is amongst the notes I took from Mike's lecture. I really like the shape of this skull. Look at the deep upper jaw with it's beautiful curves. It has such a good solid chin. Isn't it worth swooning over?! :-D After the lecture and all the questions were asked with the lights switched back on, I did a quick reconstruction which was based more heavily on what I remembered of emus, although these Dromornithids are only distantly related to emus. (We actually don't know how these birds are related to other avian lineages but some believe that they are related to primitive anatids, hence Dromornis stirtoni has been dubbed "The Demon Duck of Doom" because of its possible carnivorous habits; others think that they are distantly related to galliforms and it was really a gigantic mutated chook).

You can see the reconstructed head of Dromornis stirtoni lower lefthand corner above. I can do something more interesting with this animal I believe and that is what my next few posts will focus on. In this picture you can also see how I have drawn Thylacoleo carnifex and Thylacinus cynocephalus. Also, I have drawn the skeletal major structures of what I hoped to be closer to the marsupial form. I had an eye opening discussion with Henk Godthelp who told me that that the shoulder structure of marsupials is unique and the scapula is orientated more vertically. The pelvis is likewise in a more vertical position as opposed to the horizontal orientation that you see in placental mammals. Also there are more vertebrae attached to the pelvis of marsupials than those of placental mammals. The marsupial posture is kind of like a kidney bean with the back arched and the limbs held rather lower than it. This is most prominantly seen in bandicoots and wombats. Actually this posture can also be observed in mustilids like otters and ferrets. Henk told me I ought to dissect a possum, but I haven't been able to lay my paws on one yet and I don't fancy going out there and shooting one like many Tasmanians do here. I haven't had time to comb the road for roadkill so far. Micheal Archer told me that the forequarters of marsupials tend to be more well-built than the hindquarters. This can be observed in the Tasmanian Devil (Sarcophilus harrisii) in particular but also in the recently extinct Thylacinus cynocephalus. This is a carry over from the fact that when a marsupial is born, it is very underdeveloped but it does have strong forearms to pull itself through the mother's fur to the pouch. We are more likely to see this feature in Thylacoleo carnifex.