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Red kite (Milvus milvus) in flight, showing remiges and rectrices. Flight feathers (Pennae volatus) [1] are the long, stiff, asymmetrically shaped, but symmetrically paired pennaceous feathers on the wings or tail of a bird; those on the wings are called remiges (/ ˈ r ɛ m ɪ dʒ iː z /), singular remex (/ ˈ r iː m ɛ k s /), while those on the tail are called rectrices (/ ˈ r ɛ k t r ...
The remiges, or flight feathers of the wing, and rectrices, or flight feathers of the tail, are the most important feathers for flight. A typical vaned feather features a main shaft, called the rachis. Fused to the rachis are a series of branches, or barbs; the barbs themselves are also branched and form the barbules.
Following a preface and introduction, Feathers is divided into five main parts: "Evolution" discusses the evolutionary history of feathers, "Fluff" explains the role of feathers in regulating body temperature, "Flight" discusses the origin of avian flight as well as its impact on human aviation, "Fancy" discusses the role of feathers in sexual selection and human fashion, and "Function ...
Pterosaurs are the earliest vertebrates known to have evolved powered flight. Their wings are formed by a membrane of skin, muscle, and other tissues stretching from the ankles to a dramatically lengthened fourth finger. [9] Birds evolved flight much later. Their wings formed from elongated fingers and their arms, all covered with flight feathers.
Exaptations include the co-option of feathers, which initially evolved for heat regulation, for display, and later for use in bird flight. Another example is the lungs of many basal fish , which evolved into the lungs of terrestrial vertebrates but also underwent exaptation to become the gas bladder , a buoyancy control organ, in derived fish ...
Extremely precocial species are called "superprecocial". Examples are the megapode birds, which have full-flight feathers at hatching and which, in some species, can fly on the same day. [3] Enantiornithes [4] and pterosaurs [citation needed] were also capable of flight soon after hatching.
The calamus is hollow and has pith formed from the dry remains of the feather pulp, and the calamus opens below by an inferior umbilicus and above by a superior umbilicus. [2] The stalk above the calamus is a solid rachis having an umbilical groove on its underside. Pennaceous feathers have a rachis with vanes or vaxillum spreading to either side.
Norell et al. (2002) described BPM 1 3-13 as the first dinosaur known to have flight feathers on its legs as well as on its arms. [19] Czerkas (2002) mistakenly described the fossil as having no long feathers on its legs, but only on its hands and arms, as he illustrated on the cover of his book Feathered Dinosaurs and the Origin of Flight. [11]