Wyleyia

Taxobox
name = "Wyleyia"
fossil_range = Early Cretaceous (Berriasian/Valanginian)
regnum = Animalia
phylum = Chordata
classis = Aves
unranked_ordo = Pygostylia (disputed)
genus = "Wyleyia"
genus_authority = Harrison & Walker, 1973
subdivision_ranks=Species
subdivision=
*"W. valdensis" Harrison & Walker, 1973 (type)

"Wyleyia" is a prehistoric bird genus with a single species, "Wyleyia valdensis", known from the Early Cretaceous of England. Even this is only known from a single damaged right humerus. It has been named to honor J. F. Wyley, who found the specimen in the Weald Clay deposits of Henfield in Sussex (England). The specific name "valdensis" means "from the Weald".

The bone was found in what appears to be a Berriasian or maybe a Valanginian deposit, meaning it lived about 142-140 million years ago

Once believed by some to be from a non-avialan coelurosaur, it is now generally accepted as an early bird, although its exact systematic position is unresolved. It has been proposed to be an enantiornithine or an early neornithine palaeognathe. Even C.J.O. Harrison and C.A. Walker, usually quick to assign their species to some group, found it

"... advisable to consider the new genus "incertae sedis" until further evidence of affinity is forthcoming." [Harrison & Walker (1973)]

No new material evidence has been found. A cladistic analysis finds "W. valdensis" to be possibly a basal enantiornithine of uncertain affinities. What little information can be gleaned from it suggests it was a pygostylian - an early bird more advanced than "Archaeopteryx" and possibly related to living birds. This supposed clade may be paraphyletic however. In any case, among the "Pygostylia", it most closely resembles the early Enantiornithes and Ornithurae. It may thus be that "Wyleyia" represents a bird close fo the point in evolution where the former separated from the lineage leading to modern birds. It does not seem to be particularly close to modern birds, paleognaths or not. [Mortimer (2004)]

Footnotes

References

* (1973): "Wyleyia": a new bird humerus from the Lower Cretaceous of England. "Palaeontology" 16(4): 721-728. [http://palaeontology.palass-pubs.org/pdf/Vol%2016/Pages%20721-728.pdf PDF fulltext]
* (2004): The Theropod Database: [http://home.comcast.net/~eoraptor/Phylogeny%20of%20Taxa.html Phylogeny of taxa] . Retrieved 2008-AUG-14.