. Bulletin of the Natural Histort Museum. Geology series. DYKE. Fig. 4 Distal end of left tarsometatarsus (BMNH A 6184) in plantar view. The pointer indicates the laterally retroverted portion of trochlea metatarsi IV (the senhenhalter of Steinbacher, 1935). BMNH A 5193 since they all refer to the distal portions of the tarsometatarsus. Further, Mayr (1998) commented on the status of 'Primobitcco" olsoni and noted that it is likely that the type specimen of this taxon may also be referable to the Pseudasturidae. CONCLUSIONS (1) The referral of a number of new specimens from the Londo
. Bulletin of the Natural Histort Museum. Geology series. DYKE. Fig. 4 Distal end of left tarsometatarsus (BMNH A 6184) in plantar view. The pointer indicates the laterally retroverted portion of trochlea metatarsi IV (the senhenhalter of Steinbacher, 1935). BMNH A 5193 since they all refer to the distal portions of the tarsometatarsus. Further, Mayr (1998) commented on the status of 'Primobitcco" olsoni and noted that it is likely that the type specimen of this taxon may also be referable to the Pseudasturidae. CONCLUSIONS (1) The referral of a number of new specimens from the London Clay Formation to the extinct landbird clade Pseudasturidae Mayr confirms the fully zygodactyl foot morphology of these birds. (2) The recognition of specimens referable to the Pseudasturidae within the fossil bird collections of the London Clay Formation further serves to highlight the compositional similarity seen between this deposit and the roughly contemporaneous deposit of Grube Messel, Germany (see Mayr, 1998). At least in terms of the clades of landbirds, the two deposits are remarkably uniform in their composition (Dyke, 1998) and serve to illus- trate the 'settling' of a number of the landbird clades by the time of the earliest Eocene. Acknowledgements. For access to specimens (fossil and recent), I thank the staff of The Natural History Museum (London and Tring). Gerald Mayr (Frankfurt) kindly provided me with much access to the specimens in his care (including material on loan from the Wyoming Dinosaur Centre) and made many comments on previous versions of this manuscript. All the photographs used here were taken by Phil Crabb (NHM Photographic Serv- ices); this work was funded by a NERC studentship (GT049728ES). REFERENCES Baumel, & Witmer, 1993. Osteologica. In. Baumel, , King, , Breazile, Evans, & Vanden Berge. J. (eds). Handbook of avian anatomy: Nomina AnatDinicu Avium {2nd Edition), 45-132. Publications of the Nuttall Orn
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