Re: Spinosaurs ate pterosaurs

[David Marjanovic <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> Yes, I would agree.  Seems like a tough way to make a living: leaping off
> the ground to snatch flying insects out of the air.  Plus, this would put
> insect-catching theropods in competition with insect-catching pterosaurs,
> which had a 70 mya headstart and the wings to show for it.

I wanted to write this, too, but then I remembered the lack of known diurnal
pterosaurs that can plausibly have caught insects on the wing...

> Still, I think it's within the realm of possibility - especially if the
> insect-catching leaps were launched from trees rather than the ground.  I
> can imagine _Epidendrosaurus_ leaping from tree branches into the air to
> snatch flying insects with its jaws, then continuing down to earth.
> (Assuming, of course, that it was a parachuter or glider.)

(You're assuming it was not a parachuter; because in that case it would have
needed to climb back up the tree after each and every fly or beetle. :-S )

> Based on the published description, _Epidendrosaurus_ has the
> short wide jaws associated with snatching insects out of the air,

I wouldn't rely on that. Not because of the quality or otherwise of the
description, or the suggested attribution of the lower jaw to a lizard, but
because the fossil seemingly represents quite a small baby.