Dating from the beginning of the Eocene era, they represent the first stages in the evolution of modern birds. Assembled by the late Michael Daniels, an amateur palaeontologist, the collection is described as one of the most important of its kind in the world. Such is its scale that it will take several years to study and describe all the specimens, but initial analysis suggests at least 50 new species. Dr Andrew Kitchener, the NMS’s chief curator of vertebrates, told the Observer: “It’s so fascinating, a wonderful collection. Some of the birds have traits that are now found in different modern bird families – mixed together.” The importance of the collection “cannot be overstated”, Kitchener said, both in the UK, where there is no comparable site for bird fossils, and further afield. The specimens are even more fascinating because, despite being buried in clay for millions of years, they are preserved in three dimensions. In other locations they are usually in a cramped condition. Kitchener paid tribute to Daniels, who pledged the endowment a few months before his death last September at the age of 90. By day, Daniels’ various jobs included cabinetmaker and locksmith, but his passion was palaeontology, which took him from his home in Loughton near Epping Forest to fossil sites outside London and elsewhere in southern England. In the 1970s, he developed a more specialized interest in the Eocene London Clay – from the period after the extinction of the dinosaurs. After retiring in 1985, he moved to Holland-on-Sea to be able to pursue this interest in nearby Walton-on-the-Naze, where there is a remarkable London Clay formation. He had struck up a friendship with Kitchener 25 years ago after he and his wife, Pam, moved to Edinburgh, where their daughter Caroline lived. Visiting the NMS, they met Kitchener, who recalls, “He said, ‘I’d like to see your collection of Eocene birds.’ I said, “I’d love to show it to you, but we don’t have any.” Then he went on to tell me about his huge collection.” Kitchener remembers him as an amiable man who was largely self-taught but knew his subject and had a particular skill in searching for fossils from otherwise unpalatable lumps of clay that had been eroded from the Nazi rocks. “Previously, only occasional stray bones had been found there, but Michael discovered hundreds of more or less complete skeletons, from fragmentary bones of a large archaic falcon ancestor … to tiny bird skeletons the size of a swift-like hummingbird.” Michael Daniels, an amateur palaeontologist, makes another discovery in Walton-on-the-Naze. Photo: Brochure Daniels estimated that he drove 27,000 miles and walked 1,590 miles on field visits to Walton-on-the-Naze to collect 15 tons of London Clay. Kitchener said: “Extracting, processing, sifting and drying the residue was laborious work. Separating the relevant finds and combining fragments into some coherence involved his skills as a clockmaker, with the aid of binoculars, probes and tweezers, so that he could even extract the middle ear bones of tiny birds.’ Several of the world’s leading natural history museums had offered to provide a permanent home for the collection, but Daniels had resisted all advances. Kitchener said: “He trusted me that we would take good care of the collection. He also asked to work together [avian palaeontologist] Dr Gerald Mayr in Germany to work on the collection.’ Mayr, of the Senckenberg Research Institute, Frankfurt am Main, said: “The importance of the Michael Daniels collection cannot be overstated. There is nothing like it in the UK, certainly, and it is comparable to other bird-rich locations in the US, China and Germany. “The fact that so many specimens are preserved in three dimensions makes it one of the most important collections of its type in the world.” He just published articles on two species in the collection, one of which pays tribute to Daniels: Danielsraptor phorusrhacoides, a large, narrow-beaked, long-legged ancient hawk that looked more like an American caracara than a kestrel or peregrine falcon. Another, Nasidytes ypresianus, is an ancestor of the diver or mountain, except that, unlike today’s diver, it lacked the narrow dagger-like stick and its jaws were wider. Once the collection is fully studied, the NMS hopes to organize an exhibition, with reconstructions of the birds as they would have looked 55 million years ago.
