Birds: The Late Evolution of Dinosaurs
Recently, fossils of early birds and their most immediate predecessors have been collected at an unprecedented rate from Mesozoic-aged rocks worldwide. This wealth of new fossils has settled the century-old controversy of the origin of birds. Today, we can safely declare that birds evolved from a group of dinosaurs known as maniraptoran theropods-generally small meat-eating dinosaurs that include Velociraptor of Jurassic Park fame.
https://nhm.org/site/research-collections/dinosaur-institute/dinosaurs/birds-late-evolution-dinosaurs
A couple of early bird cousins :-
Fred Wierum Velociraptor
Fred Wierum [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Tyrannosaurus rex mmartyniuk
Matt Martyniuk [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons
Not quite the same as they appeared in Jurassic Park.
Recently, fossils of early birds and their most immediate predecessors have been collected at an unprecedented rate from Mesozoic-aged rocks worldwide. This wealth of new fossils has settled the century-old controversy of the origin of birds. Today, we can safely declare that birds evolved from a group of dinosaurs known as maniraptoran theropods-generally small meat-eating dinosaurs that include Velociraptor of Jurassic Park fame.
https://nhm.org/site/research-collections/dinosaur-institute/dinosaurs/birds-late-evolution-dinosaurs
A couple of early bird cousins :-
Fred Wierum Velociraptor
Fred Wierum [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Tyrannosaurus rex mmartyniuk
Matt Martyniuk [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons
Not quite the same as they appeared in Jurassic Park.
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