Date: 8/3/26 10:43 am From: Nick Bolgiano <nickbolgiano...> Subject: what birds survived the asteroid impact of 65 million years ago?
I summarize (and quote from) this interesting article. Nick Bolgiano
How Birds Survived the Dinosaurs’ Doomsday
By Steve Brusatte. May 2026. Scientific American 334(5): 44-51.
The author is a paleontologist who specializes in some of the first bird
species and especially those that survived the asteroid impact in the
Yucatan 65 million years ago that killed off the non-avian dinosaurs. This
article is about the characteristics of those several bird species that
survived that asteroid impact and were the ancestors of all descending
birds. Before the Cretaceous period ended 65 million years ago, “a
staggering array of birds” was present.
The asteroid impact had the force of one billion nuclear bombs and caused a
winter that lasted for years. Among all species that existed, roughly 3 of
4 went extinct. Most of these extinctions happened very quickly. All
forests would have burned and leafy plants would have disappeared because
sunshine was blocked. All species that depended upon a food chain would
have disappeared. What few birds survived?
There were two critical factors: where you lived and what you ate. “If you
were slow-growing, unable to burrow or shelter, lived in the trees or had
to eat a lot of food (especially plants) then game over.” “But if you grew
fast, could shelter or fly away from danger, loved on the ground or in the
water, and could eat seeds, then any of those assets would have been
beneficial and improved your odds at the poker table. And if you held all
of these? You would have a royal flush. Crown-group birds (i.e. members of
modern lineages) just happened to hold this hand, and they won the game.”
Two species that survived, *Vegavis* and *Asteriornis*, were duck- and
chicken-like birds that were small, had beaks instead of teeth, and lived
in or near water, were fast growing, reaching the adult stage within one
year, and very likely survived on seeds.
Finding the skeleton of a mousebird in New Mexico dating from several
million years after impact implies that many primitive crown-group species
would have branched off relatively early in an evolutionary sense after
impact. The genomes of hundreds of current species imply that major groups
of contemporary birds would have originated then, although we don’t yet
have the fossils to prove it.
