How large was the Pteranodon?
24825#0
Pteranodon (; from Greek πτερόν ( pteron, "wing") and ἀνόδων (anodon, "toothless") is a genus of pterosaur that included some of the largest known flying reptiles, with wingspans over 8 meters (26 feet). They lived during the late Cretaceous geological period of North America in present-day Kansas, Alabama, Nebraska, Wyoming, and South Dakota. More fossil specimens of "Pteranodon" have been found than any other pterosaur, with about 1,200 specimens known to science, many of them well preserved with nearly complete skulls and articulated skeletons. It was an important part of the animal community in the Western Interior Seaway.
Pteranodon
24825#5
Methods used to estimate the mass of large male "Pteranodon" specimens (those with wingspans of about 7 meters) have been notoriously unreliable, producing a wide range of estimates from as low as to as high as . In a review of pterosaur size estimates published in 2010, researchers Mark Witton and Mike Habib demonstrated that the latter, largest estimates are almost certainly incorrect given the total volume of a "Pteranodon" body, and could only be correct if the animal "was principally aluminium". Witton and Habib considered the methods used by researchers who obtained smaller mass estimates equally flawed. Most have been produced by scaling modern animals such as bats and birds up to "Pteranodon" size, despite the fact that pterosaurs have vastly different body proportions and soft tissue anatomy from any living animal.
Pteranodon
24825#20
Adult "Pteranodon" specimens may be divided into two distinct size classes, small and large, with the large size class being about one and a half times larger than the small class, and the small class being twice as common as the large class. Both size classes lived alongside each other, and while researchers had previously suggested that they represent different species, Christopher Bennett showed that the differences between them are consistent with the concept that they represent females and males, and that "Pteranodon" species were sexually dimorphic. Skulls from the larger size class preserve large, upward and backward pointing crests, while the crests of the smaller size class are small and triangular. Some larger skulls also show evidence of a second crest that extended long and low, toward the tip of the beak, which is not seen in smaller specimens.
Pteranodon
9438266#127
"Pteranodon" was a large Pterosaur, notable for its skull crest. These may have been used as mating displays, or it might have acted as a rudder, or perhaps both; also, it may have acted as a counterweight to the large beak. Despite its huge size, at "Pteranodon" is not the biggest of the pterosaurs; creatures such as "Quetzalcoatlus" could reach .
List of creatures in Primeval
8553292#1
It is based on the type specimen or holotype BPV-078, an incomplete skeleton and skull. Its skull, including a large crest, was toothless and similar to that of "Pteranodon". The skull lacks the point of the snout but it was in life less than 200 millimeters long (7.9 inches), and the animal had a wingspan of about 1.1 meters (3.6 feet). A second specimen, D2526, described in 2006, had a larger wingspan. Despite its similarities to "Pteranodon", "Eopteranodon" was not placed into a family by its describers, who put it into the clade Pteranodontia as "incertae sedis" (uncertain position).
Eopteranodon
24825#23
The fact that females appear to have outnumbered males two to one suggests that, as with modern animals with size-related sexual dimorphism, such as sea lions and other pinnipeds, "Pteranodon" might have been polygynous, with a few males competing for association with groups consisting of large numbers of females. Similar to modern pinnipeds, "Pteranodon" may have competed to establish territory on rocky, offshore rookeries, with the largest, and largest-crested, males gaining the most territory and having more success mating with females. The crests of male "Pteranodon" would not have been used in competition, but rather as "visual dominance-rank symbols", with display rituals taking the place of physical competition with other males. If this hypothesis is correct, it also is likely that male "Pteranodon" played little to no part in rearing the young; such a behavior is not found in the males of modern polygynous animals who father many offspring at the same time.
Pteranodon
24825#9
The wing shape of "Pteranodon" suggests that it would have flown rather like a modern-day albatross. This is based on the fact that "Pteranodon" had a high aspect ratio (wingspan to chord length) similar to that of the albatross — 9:1 for "Pteranodon", compared to 8:1 for an albatross. Albatrosses spend long stretches of time at sea fishing, and use a flight pattern called "dynamic soaring" which exploits the vertical gradient of wind speed near the ocean surface to travel long distances without flapping, and without the aid of thermals (which do not occur over the open ocean the same way they do over land). While most of a "Pteranodon" flight would have depended on soaring, like long-winged seabirds, it probably required an occasional active, rapid burst of flapping, and studies of "Pteranodon" wing loading (the strength of the wings vs. the weight of the body) indicate that they were capable of substantial flapping flight, contrary to some earlier suggestions that they were so big they could only glide.
Pteranodon
24825#4
Adult male "Pteranodon" were among the largest pterosaurs, and were the largest flying animals known until the late 20th century, when the giant azhdarchid pterosaurs were discovered. The wingspan of an average adult male "Pteranodon" was . Adult females were much smaller, averaging in wingspan. The largest specimen of "Pteranodon longiceps" from the Niobrara Formation measured from wingtip to wingtip. An even larger specimen is known from the Pierre Shale Formation, with a wingspan of , though this specimen may belong to the distinct genus and species "Geosternbergia maysei". While most specimens are found crushed, enough fossils exist to put together a detailed description of the animal.
Pteranodon
24825#3
Adult "Pteranodon" specimens from the two major species can be divided into two distinct size classes. The smaller class of specimens have small, rounded head crests and very wide pelvic canals, even wider than those of the much larger size class. The size of the pelvic canal probably allowed the laying of eggs, indicating that these smaller adults are females. The larger size class, representing male individuals, have narrow hips and very large crests, which were probably for display.
Pteranodon
570428#10
The "Pteranodon" sequence took much time to create, primarily because of how hard it would be to make a model pterosaur pick up a real woman. However the solution was simple: Instead of using a large crane on location, the crew had Raquel Welch fall behind a rock, and then the model "Pteranodon" swoops down and flies off with a model of Welch, which was substituted during the single second in which she is behind the rock and not visible. Later, when the creature takes her to its nest, the nest was matted into the scene atop a real rock face by double printing the film. For the "Pteranodon" and "Rhamphorhynchus" fight scene, when she is dropped into the water, Harryhausen and the crew released her from two dummy rubber "Pteranodon" claws and while the real Welch fell onto a mattress, the film cut to a long shot of the Welch model suspended on wires.
One Million Years B.C.