Were Pterosauria the ancestor of birds?

Logically, Pterosauria were the first species in the history to be able to fly freely in the sky. And after birds appeared, it seems reasonable that Pterosauria were the ancestors of birds. However, Pterosauria were not the ancestors of modern birds!

First of all, let’s be clear that the most basic feature of birds is to have feathered wings, not to be able to fly! Pterosaur, also known as Pterosauria, is an extinct reptile that lived from the Late Triassic to the end of the Cretaceous. Although it has the characteristics of flying which is very similar to birds, they do not have the feathers. In addition, Pterosauria and birds belonged to two different systems in the process of evolution. No matter how they developed, Pterosauria could not evolve into birds, let alone the ancestors of birds.

So where did birds evolve from? There is currently no definite answer in the scientific community. We only know that Archaeopteryx is the earliest bird we know, and they appeared in the late Jurassic period, living in the same period as the dinosaurs, so it is more appropriate to say that Archaeopteryx is the ancestor of modern birds.

It is difficult to form bird fossils, which makes the study of ancient birds even more difficult. Scientists can only roughly draw the outline of the ancient bird based on those fragmented clues, but the real ancient sky may be completely different from our imagination, what do you think?

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