Confuciusornithidae

Confuciusornithidae is an extinct family of pygostylian avialans known from the Early Cretaceous, found in northern China. They are commonly placed as a sister group to Ornithothoraces, a group that contains all extant birds along with their closest extinct relatives. Confuciusornithidae contains four genera, possessing both shafted and non-shafted (downy) feathers. Some specimens probably referable to this clade represents one of the earliest known fossil evidence of primary feather moulting. They are also noted for their distinctive pair of ribbon-like tail feathers of disputed function.

Confuciusornithidae

Uncredited · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
ConfuciusornithiformesPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Coelurosauria
Life habit
ground dwelling, solitaryPBDB, for Theropoda
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Theropoda

Time the record covers

At most 20 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 132.6 Mya and 113.2 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Early Cretaceous — about 25 of 25 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous133–132 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences132–132 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences132–131 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences131–130 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences130–130 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences130–129 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences129–128 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences128–128 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences128–127 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences127–126 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences126–126 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences126–125 Mya — about 2 occurrences125–124 Mya — about 2 occurrences124–124 Mya — about 2 occurrences124–123 Mya — about 2 occurrences123–122 Mya — about 2 occurrences122–122 Mya — about 2 occurrences122–121 Mya — about 2 occurrences121–120 Mya — about 2 occurrences120–120 Mya — about 2 occurrences120–119 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences119–118 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences118–117 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences117–117 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences117–116 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences116–115 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences115–115 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences115–114 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences114–113 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences113–113 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences133.1 Mya112.7 Mya

25 occurrences of Confuciusornithidae on record, most of them in the Early Cretaceous. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

25 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

4 formations

Yixian — 41.80°N, 120.73°EYixian — 41.60°N, 120.87°EYixian — 41.60°N, 120.82°EYixian — 41.60°N, 120.98°EYixian — 40.00°N, 116.67°EYixian — 41.59°N, 121.63°EYixian — 41.42°N, 118.97°EJiufotang — 41.42°N, 120.18°EJiufotang — 43.64°N, 120.43°EJiufotang — 41.57°N, 120.16°EJiufotang — 40.59°N, 119.58°EJiufotang — 40.91°N, 119.50°EJiufotang — 40.65°N, 119.68°EDabeigou — 41.66°N, 116.40°EHuajiying — 40.37°N, 116.36°E

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The named rock units Confuciusornithidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Confuciusornithidae and its relatives

Early Cretaceous

Where Confuciusornithidae and its relatives were recorded in the Early Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

122 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 23 sites for Confuciusornithidae, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

18 references

Each of the 25 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 6 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Confuciusornithidae

Credit
nobody named on the record
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Confuciusornithidae was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itConfuciusornithiformes through timeFormations of the Early CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Hou et al. 1995