rising@utzoo.uucp (Jim Rising) (04/11/89)
Birds are not particularly closely related to turtles. The turtles represent one lineage of amniotes descended from stem reptiles. Birds & alligators are modern representatives of another (the subclass Archosauria that included as well "dinosaurs" and pterosaurs). Snakes & lizards, mammals, ichthyosaurs, and plesiosaurs likewise represent similarly distinct lineages--and these all appeared in the late Paleozoic Era or early Mesozoic--about 280 000 000. So, modern birds aren't any more closely related to modern turtles than we are. --Jim Rising -- Name: Jim Rising Mail: Dept. Zoology, Univ. Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 1A1 UUCP: uunet!attcan!utzoo!rising BITNET: rising@utzoo.utoronto.bitnet