Ctenochasmatoidea

Ctenochasmatoidea
Fossil of Ctenochasma elegans
Temporal occurrence
Hettangium ( Lower Jurassic ) to Albium ( Lower Cretaceous )
201.3 to 100.5 million years
Locations
worldwide
Systematics
Diapsida Archosauria Ornithodira Flugsaurier (Pterosauria) Short-tailed pterosaur (Pterodactyloidea) Ctenochasmatoidea
Scientific name
Ctenochasmatoidea
Nopcsa , 1928

The Ctenochasmatoidea are a group of small to medium-sized short - tailed pterosaurs that occurred worldwide from the Lower Jurassic to the Lower Cretaceous .

features

Their characteristic feature is the elongated snout, rounded at the front, in which the more advanced Ctenochasmatidae contained a trap bite consisting of numerous long teeth sitting on the edges of the jaw. They probably waded for their small animal food in shallow areas of rivers and lakes. In Poland (Wierzbica Quarry), one to two centimeters long, sausage-shaped coprolites were found that contained snail shells, lime shells of unicellular algae and parts of crustaceans and worms. From the footprints and handprints located directly next to the coproliths, one can conclude that they must be the coprolites of ctenochasmatoid pterosaurs.

The evolutionary trend led from the simple, still little adapted form pterodactylus to an extension of the neck, the snout and, in the case of the Ctenochasmatinae, to an increase in ever thinner teeth and finally reached its peak in the Argentine Pterodaustro , which is needle-thin via a sieve apparatus of over 1000, long teeth and must have fed on plankton , which he sifted out of the water like today's flamingos .

The Gnathosaurinae, on the other hand, stayed with larger teeth and seem to have caught larger prey. The lengthening of the neck was achieved by lengthening the cervical vertebrae, not by increasing them, as was the case later with the Azhdarchids .

Pterodaustro

Cearadactylus

Internal system

• Ctenochasmatoidea
  • Cycnorhamphus
  • Feilongus
  • Pterodactylus
  • Unwindia
  • Ctenochasmatidae
    • Elanodactylus
    • Gegepterus
    • Ctenochasmatinae
      • Beipiaopterus
      • Ctenochasma
      • Eosipterus
      • Pterodaustro
    • Gnathosaurinae
      • Cearadactylus
      • Gnathosaurus
      • Huanhepterus
      • Plataleorhynchus
      • Pterodactylus longicollum

swell

• David M. Unwin: The Pterosaurs. From deep time. PI Press, New York NY 2006, ISBN 0-13-146308-X :
• Peter Wellnhofer : Pterosaurs. Pterosauria (= The new Brehm library. 534, ISSN  0138-1423 ). Ziemsen, Wittenberg Lutherstadt 1980.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Qvarnström M, Elgh E, Owocki K, Ahlberg PE, Niedźwiedzki G. 2019. Filter feeding in Late Jurassic pterosaurs supported by coprolite contents. PeerJ 7: e7375 doi: 10.7717 / peerj.7375
2. ^ Brian Andres, Ji Qiang: A new pterosaur from the Liaoning Province of China, the phylogeny of the Pterodactyloidea, and convergence in their cervical vertebrae. In: Palaeontology. Vol. 51, No. 2, 2008, ISSN  0031-0239 , pp. 453-469, doi : 10.1111 / j.1475-4983.2008.00761.x .
3. ↑ Xiaolin Wang, Alexander WA Kellner, Zhonghe Zhou , Diogenes de Almeida Campos: A new pterosaur (Ctenochasmatidae, Archaeopterodactyloidea) from the Lower Cretaceous Yixian Formation of China. In: Cretaceous Research. Vol. 28, No. 2, 2007, ISSN  0195-6671 , pp. 245-260, doi : 10.1016 / j.cretres.2006.08.004 .

Web links

Commons : Ctenochasmatoidea  - collection of images, videos and audio files