Stephen Czerkas: A Case of Embarrassment?

One of Stephen Czerkas' feathered Deinonychus sculptures. (Public domain image from Wikipedia)

Well, folks, I finally got an idea for a new post. I actually thought of this months ago, but kept forgetting to write it down. Today I want to talk about Stephen Czerkas. Specifically, I want to talk about his recent positions on bird evolution, and a possible cause of them.

In the 80s and most of the 90s, Stephen Czerkas was a name that was fairly well respected in the paleo community. In addition to being a paleoartist who made beautiful sculptures, he was also recognized as an amateur paleontologist. As the latter, he was perhaps best known for describing dermal spines on Diplodocus.

However, in 1999, things took an unfortunate turn. Czerkas purchased a bird fossil from China at the Tuscon Gem and Mineral Show. The fossil, which appeared to be a bird with a long, bony tail, was dubbed "Archaeoraptor" by Czerkas. He wrote up a description of this find, but the major journals Science and Nature rejected the paper. Finally, an article of the espousing the apparently revolutionary find was published in National Geographic. Unfortunately, closer scientific study revealed that "Archaeoraptor" specimen was not that of a single animal, but rather a chimera, the tail of what would later be named Microraptor attached to the skeleton of a short-tailed bird, probably Yanornis.

A few years later, Czerkas published a book called Feathered Dinosaurs and the Origin of Flight. In it, he and his colleagues published descriptions of some feathered dinosaur and bird fossils (as well as a couple pterosaurs). However, the discussions in some of the papers presented some odd conclusions. For example, in the paper on Scansoriopteryx, it was stated that it could not have been a theropod, due to its long third finger and apparent climbing ability. In the Cryptovolans paper, he argued that dromaeosaurs were actually birds. Overall, the whole book seemed to be championing a BAND and MANIAC position (if you don't know what these mean, consult this post).

What interests me, however, is why he began to support this position in the first place. The reason for this is that in the National Geographic "Archaeoraptor" article, Czerkas is quoted as apparently being in support of a dinosaurian origin of birds. This in turn makes me wonder if the "Archaeoraptor" fiasco might have had something to do with his change in position on this issue. Could he have been so embarrassed by the fact that the fossil he promoted was not genuine that he attempted to save himself by jumping for the opposite viewpoint? I'm only speculating here, but I think it is a possibility. Regardless of why he went the direction he did, I think it was an unfortunate turn of events. It is especially painful for me because I am a big fan of his sculptures, and I think his feathered Deinonychus are some of his most beautiful work to date. As such, I feel hit especially hard by the tragedy of Stephen Czerkas.