That's really cool. Knowing that all the creatures weren't whims of your imagination (well, they are, but that they're based on real creatures) helps set your mind-clock back to before anything really had much of a mind-clock. To think that what we consider to be so archaic and strange was once new and perfectly normal... I love how you took what most people know almost nothing about except that they have fossils and gave them life and character, as well as returning them to their proper age. The only other example I've seen of this is the movie Ice Age, and that came after the Ratha books.
I love protohistory. Please post more, and I'll let you sleep in the driest den you let me have the other day. :P

:^D After reading a Scientific American article about some of the American Pleistocene species, I was briefly inspired to write a story from the point of view of one of them, trying to survive extinction as the humans invaded. ^__^ This sounds a lot like that idea! Kool! :^D

The path of destiny takes strange turns...
...where will it lead you next?

My birdy story will probably be set around where I live, except before humans came over... or at least, when there were few enough that they weren't noticed a whole lot. Or maybe it will be like Guardians of Ga'hoole, set in the future after human extinction and when the world's sort of in an Age of Birds. :P
Ooh, does anyone here know about microraptors? Those things are so awesome...

I am so glad you enjoyed the post. I've been fascinated by fossils and paleontology since I was 7 or 8. I like using fossils and fossil reconstructions as a sort of springboard for the imagination.

I know absolutely nothing about microraptors. Are they small hawks, like the sparrowhawk? Or are we talking dinosaurs?
I'm assuming they're birds.

Ratha to author "You're not going to get me up on top of THAT creature!"

Microraptors are one of the protoavians; a dinosaur-bird mix, a tweener, like the archaopteryx. Microraptors had four wings and no legs, and while they may have once been important, I think it's pretty easy to see why nature ditched the idea.
Here's the Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microraptor

You are right - microraptors are neat. Four wings! Are you going to write about them?

I just had an idea for you. Somewhere there must be an osprey webcam. I saw a bald eagle webcam while net-surfing the other day.
You might check.

Ratha to author "You're not going to get me up on top of THAT creature!"

me too! thats awesome! i love old artifacts and evidence of life. once we went to this fossil place and found fish fossils. some were like perfect.:)

I saw some osprey cams the other day, but they were offline... I should check again though. Thanks for reminding me XD
Maybe I'll put some protoavians in my story, just because they're cool, not because osprey existed when they did, obviously :P Or eagles, for that matter. Unfortunately, microraptors couldn't actually fly, only glide. Writing about prehistoric birds could be fun, though. I wonder if any were social...

For two reasons:

They are closely related to troodonts and dromesaurs, who were probably among the most intelligent dinos.

Many of their close relatives, such as Velociraptor, evidently hunted in packs.

You might, just for fun, try reading Raptor Red by Robert Bakker.
He's a well-known paleontologist and he reconstructs the life of a raptor dinosaur in fascinating detail.

R.

Ratha to author "You're not going to get me up on top of THAT creature!"

Raptor Red... I'll look into it. Thanks.