A closer look at the Pterorhynchus wing tip
Pterorhynchus wellnhoferi (Czerkas and Ji 2002) Callovian, Middle Jurassic ~165mya, was the first wukongopterid/darwinopterid to be described. Originally it was famous for its soft rostral crest and later for its chin fuzz.
It also has a pretty nice wing tip ungual (Fig. 1) on its broken wing tip. According to most pterosaur experts, that ungual is not supposed to be there.
Figure 1. Several views of the Pterorhynchus wingtip. The ungual (manual4.5) has been colored magenta. Manual 4.4 (green) is broken.
And I noticed something odd
in the lower abdomen. I can’t make out what it is, I’ll let you guess. It could be food. It could be a developing embryo and eggshell. It could be detritus.
Figure 2. Pterorhynchus torso under UV light. There is an unexpected ellipse in the lower abdomen. Only the fan of the perforated prepubis appears here, on top of the ischium + pubis. 3 frames, each 5 seconds. Click to enlarge.
References
Czerkas SA and Ji Q 2002. A new rhamphorhynchoid with a headcrest and complex integumentary structures. In: Czerkas SJ ed. Feathered Dinosaurs and the Origin of Flight. The Dinosaur Museum:Blanding, Utah, 15-41. ISBN 1-93207-501-1.
Lü J, Unwin DM, Jin X, Liu Y and Ji Q 2009. Evidence for modular evolution in a long-tailed pterosaur with a pterodactyloid skull. Proceedings of the Royal Society London B (DOI 10.1098/rspb.2009.1603.)
Lü J, Xu L, Chang H and Zhang X 2011b. A new darwinopterid pterosaur from the Middle Jurassic of Western Liaoning, northeastern China and its ecological implicaitions. Acta Geologica Sinica 85: 507-514.
Zhou C-F and Schoch RR 2011. New material of the non-pterodactyloid pterosaur Changchengopterus pani LÜ, 2009 from the Late Jurassic Tiaojishan Formation of western Liaoning. N. Jb. Geol. Paläont. Abh. 260/3, 265–275 published online March 2011.
wiki/Darwinopterus
wiki/Pterorhynchus
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Source: https://pterosaurheresies.wordpress.com/2016/03/19/a-closer-look-at-the-pterorhynchus-wing-tip/
