Quantitative Analysis of Morphometric Data of Pre-modern Birds: Phylogenetic Versus Ecological Signal
Birds are one of the most diverse clades of extant terrestrial vertebrates, a diversity that first arose during the Mesozoic as a multitude of lineages of pre-neornithine (stem) birds appeared but did not survive into the Cenozoic Era.Modern birds (Neornithes) inhabit an extensive array of ecologically distinct habitats and have specific and varied