DOI: 10.5061/dryad.mkkwh70wg
title: Data from: Late Cretaceous bird from Madagascar reveals unique development of beaks

description: Mesozoic birds display considerable diversity in size, flight adaptations
 and feather organization, but exhibit relatively conserved patterns of
 beak shape and development. Although Neornithine (that is, crown group)
 birds also exhibit constraint on facial development, they have
 comparatively diverse beak morphologies associated with a range of feeding
 and behavioural ecologies, in contrast to Mesozoic birds. Here we describe
 a crow-sized stem bird, Falcatakely forsterae gen. et sp. nov., from the
 Late Cretaceous epoch of Madagascar that possesses a long and deep
 rostrum, an expression of beak morphology that was previously unknown
 among Mesozoic birds and is superficially similar to that of a variety of
 crown-group birds (for example, toucans). The rostrum of Falcatakely is
 composed of an expansive edentulous maxilla and a small tooth-bearing
 premaxilla. Morphometric analyses of individual bony elements and
 three-dimensional  rostrum shape reveal the development of a
 neornithine-like facial anatomy despite the retention of a
 maxilla–premaxilla organization that is similar to that of 
 nonavialan theropods. The patterning and increased height of the rostrum
 in Falcatakely reveals a degree of developmental lability and increased
 morphological disparity that was previously unknown in early branching
 avialans. Expression of this phenotype (and presumed ecology) in a stem
 bird underscores that consolidation to the neornithine-like,
 premaxilla-dominated rostrum was not an evolutionary prerequisite for beak
 enlargement.
description: See supplementary file (PDF) for methods used in this paper.
description: <strong>1. O'Connor et al Supplementary
 File: </strong>Supplementary tables/appendices: 3D coordinate
 changes related to digital reconstructions, landmark identification for
 geometric morphometric analyses, list of phylogenetic characters, list of
 supplementary figure captions, etc. <strong>2.
 TWIG_primary</strong>: Nexus File, with executable fxs for Bayesian
 analysis conducted in paper based on modified matrix from the Theropod
 Working Group (TWIG) iterations of Turner et al. (2012) and Brusatte et
 al. (2014). [A. Turner] <strong>3.
 TWIG_primary_MRC.</strong> Tree file (Majority Rule Consensus) of
 the Bayesian analysis using the TWIG matrix. [A. Turner]
 <strong>4. Falcatakely_SS_analyses</strong>: Nexus
 File, with executable fxs for Bayesian analysis conducted in paper based
 on modified matrix from the Theropod Working Group (TWIG) iterations of
 Turner et al. (2012) and Brusatte et al. (2014); used in stepping stone
 analysis and alternative hypothesis testing for the position
 of <em>Falcatakely</em> [A. Turner]
 <strong>5.
 TWIG_primary_apomorphies.txt.</strong> Listing of node-specific
 support information based on the TWIG analysis. [A. Turner]
 <strong>6. WEA2019_primary:</strong> Nexus File, with
 executable fxs for Bayesian analysis conducted in paper and based on
 modified matrix from Wang and Zhou (2019), with modifications from Field
 et al. (2018). [A. Turner] <strong>7.
 WEA_primary_MRC.</strong> Tree file (Majority Rule Consensus) of the
 Bayesian analysis using the Wang and Zhou (2019) WEA matrix. [A.
 Turner] <strong>8.
 WEA_partitioned</strong>: Nexus File, with executable fxs for
 Bayesian analysis conducted in paper and based on modified matrix from
 Wang and Zhou (2019), with modifications from Field et al. (2018);
 partitioning reflects cranial versus postcranial character data [A.
 Turner] <strong>9.
 WEA_sensitivity_archaeopteryx</strong>: Nexus File, with executable
 fxs for Bayesian analysis conducted in paper and based on modified matrix
 from Wang and Zhou (2019), with modifications from Field et al. (2018);
 sensitivity reflects coding <em>Archaeopteryx</em> for just
 cranial data [A. Turner] <strong>10.
 WEA_sensitivity_sapeornis</strong>: Nexus File, with executable fxs
 for Bayesian analysis conducted in paper and based on modified matrix from
 Wang and Zhou (2019), with modifications from Field et al. (2018);
 sensitivity reflects coding <i>Sapeornis </i>for just cranial
 data [A. Turner] <strong>11.
 WEA_primary_apomorphies.txt.</strong> Listing of node-specific
 support information based on the Wang and Zhou (2019), with modifications
 from Field et al. (2018), analysis. [A. Turner]
 <b>12. <i>Falcatakely_</i>Interactive
 morphospace plot of 3D rostrum shape. HTML file.  </b>Plot of first
 two principal components of 3D landmark analysis of rostrum
 of <i>Falcatakely</i> <i>forsterae</i> and extant
 avian taxa. Hovering over data points reveals species name and order.
 Supraordinal groups can be toggled on/off by clicking on the legend.This
 is an .html document that can be viewed in standard web browsers. [R.
 Felice] <strong>13. </strong><b>3D
 PDF S1.</b> Polygon surface models (from CT data) for in-situ
 reconstruction. [Groenke] <b>14. 3D PDF S2.</b>
 Polygon surface models (from CT data) for Beauchêne-style reconstruction.
 [Groenke]