RE: Aetodactylus, the Dallas pterosaur

[Jaime Headden <qi_leong@hotmail.com>]

  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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