I'm just a Paleobiology major trying to share the beauty of the past, praise silt, and all of its wonders yet to be uncovered.
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
![Things that Weren’t - Pterodactyl
Okay, so I know somebody’s going to get mad that I’m nit picking, but so what? This is an issue that I need to get off my chest. There is no such thing as a pterodactyl. Usually when somebody says pterodactyl, they are thinking of a pteranodon, any other pterosaur, or, maybe, pterodactylus, which is really close, but it’s not really the same, is it? Anyway, let’s talk about pterosaurs. Pterosaurs were flying reptiles, as you may guess by their name, as it means winged lizard, though ptero has been used in place of fins in some cases. They lived in the late Triassic through the end of the Cretaceous. They were the earliest known vertebrates to evolve powered flight. Their wing was formed by a membrane of skin, muscle, and tissues, stretched between an extremely exaggerated fourth finger and somewhere on the torso of the pterosaur. They are often referred to as flying dinosaurs in popular media and by the general public, but are not dinosaurs, as they do not fit into the clade dinosauria. I may have been a bit misleading before that Pterodactyls don’t exist. They do, but it’s an improper name for the genus pterodactylus, and, occasionally, pterodactyloidea, however, it’s like calling an apatosaurus a brontosaurus, it is not correct, and you are a detriment to the scientific literacy if you do it.
Photo:
By Kenn Chaplin from Toronto, Canada (ROM Dinosaurs 019 Uploaded by FunkMonk) [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2w3u8TL9j1qhp1q0o1_500.jpg)
Things that Weren’t - Pterodactyl
Okay, so I know somebody’s going to get mad that I’m nit picking, but so what? This is an issue that I need to get off my chest. There is no such thing as a pterodactyl. Usually when somebody says pterodactyl, they are thinking of a pteranodon, any other pterosaur, or, maybe, pterodactylus, which is really close, but it’s not really the same, is it? Anyway, let’s talk about pterosaurs. Pterosaurs were flying reptiles, as you may guess by their name, as it means winged lizard, though ptero has been used in place of fins in some cases. They lived in the late Triassic through the end of the Cretaceous. They were the earliest known vertebrates to evolve powered flight. Their wing was formed by a membrane of skin, muscle, and tissues, stretched between an extremely exaggerated fourth finger and somewhere on the torso of the pterosaur. They are often referred to as flying dinosaurs in popular media and by the general public, but are not dinosaurs, as they do not fit into the clade dinosauria. I may have been a bit misleading before that Pterodactyls don’t exist. They do, but it’s an improper name for the genus pterodactylus, and, occasionally, pterodactyloidea, however, it’s like calling an apatosaurus a brontosaurus, it is not correct, and you are a detriment to the scientific literacy if you do it.
Photo:
By Kenn Chaplin from Toronto, Canada (ROM Dinosaurs 019 Uploaded by FunkMonk) [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Pterodactylus
I’m going to be doing the PSA on Pterodactylus!
Pterodactylus (I love how tumblr (Should I capitalize that even though they don’t capitalize it themselves?) has italics.) is a genus of pterosaur, the first to be identified as a flying reptile. The fossil remains of Pterodactylus are primarily found in Bavaria, Germany in Solnofen limestone, and has been dated to have lived in the late late Jurassic (early Tithonian), so about 150.8-148.5 million years ago, though other fossil remains have been found throughout Europe and in Africa. The name Pterodactylus comes from the greek words pteron and daktylos meaning (in succession) ‘wing’ and ‘finger’. and refers to the way that the wing is supported by one large finger. It has been determined that Pterodactylus was carnivorous, feeding on fish and other small animals.
Also, Pterodactylus was not a dinosaur, it was a pterosaur, completely different.
Okay followers, let me know if I should go further, or if a simple and concise PSA is enough, I feel like simplicity is good, but I also feel that I could be more detailed, this is up to your discretion though, you are the viewers after all, and I aim to please! If i get a following, I may begin to do this how I do my Text Message PSAs, that being that I would let the first replier choose the next subject, but seeing as I only have three followers right now, it seems impractical to do so right now.
