Flying Mammals Flew Over the Heads of Dinosaurs

The Southern Flying Squirrel (Glaucomys volans) just got a new ancestor. Image courtesy of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, public domain.





Joel Kontinen

The fossil record can be a nightmare for Darwinian evolution, as animals often appear fully formed in the wrong places, don’t evolve for aeons and any assumed intermediate forms (aka missing links) tend to be more or less suspicious.

The recent discovery of two Jurassic Era mammals – Maiopatagium furculiferum and Vilevolodon diplomyl – reminds us that Darwin-only textbooks are badly outdated.

What is more, Maiopatagium looked like modern flying squirrels.

We already knew that some mammals, such as Repenomamus giganticus that looked a lot like the Tasmanian devil, might have eaten small dinosaurs.

And then there were Jurassic squirrels and flowering plants.

Some mammals predated dinosaurs, if the fossil record is to be trusted.

The Book of Genesis shows us that God created all kinds of animals (but not species) at the same time, so dino-era flying mammals should not surprise us.

Source:

Gabbott, Sarah. 2017. First 'winged' mammals flew over dinosaurs. BBC News (10 August).