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RE: Aetodactylus, the Dallas pterosaur
Forgive me if I am repeating something others know, but ornithocheiroids
described to date appear to have an mediolaterally expanded rostrum/mandible
tip. This alone is irrelevant to the specimen's affinities, if this is one of
the two apparent criteria being used to imploy its affinities, I would consider
it fascile. However, you mention also that the mandible is very shallow, which
would apply to this hinted-at, yet obvious Solnhofen "type" of pterosaur (for
the record, ctenochasmatids are apparently more widespread than the Solnhofen
Limestones of the Late Jurassic of Germany). If this were true, you might be
on firmer ground, but my records indicate that ctenochasmatid mandibles appear
particularly deep, although not deeper than most pterosaur mandibles, and also
feature unique retroarticular morphology.
I would also overlook this casual hand wave to the ctenochasmatids, were it
not for an inferrence you made to Dave Hone on the apparent identity of the
ornithocheiroid *Zhengyuanopterus* where the presence of long, large and
numerous teeth were applied as ctenochasmatic features -- *Aetodactylus* has
well-spaced teeth with pedunculate sockets that differentiate it from most
other pterosaurs, yet links it with anhanguerine-line ornithocheiroids.
Therefore, it is the opposite of your inferrence. Are you assessing ALL of the
information, or picking one bit here and there to play with?
Cheers,
Jaime A. Headden
The Bite Stuff (site v2)
http://qilong.wordpress.com/
"Innocent, unbiased observation is a myth." --- P.B. Medawar (1969)
"Ever since man first left his cave and met a stranger with a
different language and a new way of looking at things, the human race
has had a dream: to kill him, so we don't have to learn his language or
his new way of looking at things." --- Zapp Brannigan (Beast With a Billion
Backs)
----------------------------------------
> Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2010 04:42:46 -0500
> From: davidpeters@att.net
> To: dinosaur@usc.edu
> Subject: Aetodactylus, the Dallas pterosaur
>
> Myers, Timothy S.(2010) 'A new ornithocheirid pterosaur from the Upper
> Cretaceous (Cenomanian- Turonian) Eagle Ford Group of Texas', Journal of
> Vertebrate Paleontology, 30: 1, 280 — 287
>
> I don't know of any ornithocheirid with such a dorsoventrally flattened
> mandible with a slight dishy curve. But there are other such taxa in the
> Solnhofen formation, all smaller. Methinks it's more like one of those.
>
> David Peters
> St. Louis
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