[valkyry1]

Sorry for your fantasy, but spiny fins or other fin based structures would not last anytime at all for sustained operation supporting and locomoting the fish about on hard dry land. The fish was a bottom and shallow water feeder thats all.

This example is not to far away from Darwin’s fantasy wherein he imagined the flying (Gliding) fish to evolving into a genuine flying creature fully capable of powered flight such as a bird or bat.

The mudskipper is still a mudskipper, the crawling catfish is still limited to his spiny fins and gills, and none of the gliding creatures have ever developed more advanced capability of flight.

[allmendream]

Who said Tiktaalik needed “sustained” locomotion on dry land? All it needed was to walk well enough to confer an advantage over its non walking cohorts. And to survive long enough to pass on its traits to its likely descendants, the amphibians.