Urfeathers

Phenomena, which is the site that hosts Not Exactly Rocket Science, has a post today about Archaeopterix, the "wingless bird with hairy feathers" we all remember from the old cartoon "B.C."  A new specimen preserves some fantastic detail in the feathers.  It seems that dinosaurs first developed feathers for insulation, display, or some such thing, and only later did some species find them useful in developing flight.