Re: Ankylosauria and Scelidosaurus

[Jay <sappororaptor@yahoo.com>]

--- Nick Gardner <nick.gardner@gmail.com> wrote:

> Given that Scelidosaurus is now falling out lately in cladistic
> analyses with ankylosaurs, is Ankylosauria defined in such a way that
> precludes Scelidosaurus from inclusion...

*All Eurypods closer to Ankylosaurus than to Stegosaurus* wouldn't exclude it 
from Ankylosauria.
BTW, that is the active definition. Taxon Search cites Sereno 2005 as the 
author, but Vickaryous
et al 2004 should be, if not any earlier authors if definded before Vickaryous 
& co.   


> ...or would it be  a part of
> Ankylosauria as well? I'm not aware of what definitions have been
> applied to Ankylosauria thus far.

Another possibility would be Ankylosauria be *restricted to Nodosauridae + 
Ankylosaurid*.  In this
case, it doesn't really matter if Nodosauridae turn out to be paraphletic to 
Ankylosauridae or
not.
The clade name Ankylosauromorpha is *probably* available for Scelidosaurus + 
Ankylosauria, However
taxon search has noted discrepancies in its definition. 
One such definition: (*All thyreophorans closer to Scelidosaurus than to 
Stegosaurus*) means that
Ankylosauromorpha may equate to Scelidosaurus only if Stegosaurus is found to 
be closer to
Ankylosaurus than Scelidosaurus is.

Bottomline: Wheather Scelidosaurus becomes is closer to Ankylosauria or outside 
Eurypoda isn't
going to change the clade names, which seem pretty stable in my opinion (the 
definitions of).
Read Carpenter's paper on ankylosaur phylogeny (it's freely available @
https://scientists.dmns.org/sites/kencarpenter/PDFs of publications/Anki 
Phylogenetics.pdf). It
gives a reasonable account of the characters uniting Scelidosaurus with 
ankylosaurs.


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