Wed, May 28, 2008
Azhdarchids
Posted to Current Events category
Azhdarchids were huge pterosaurs: as tall a giraffes when they were standing on all fours. Darren Naish, who writes Tetrapod Zoology, ones of my favorite blogs, has just published a formal article about how Azhdarchids lived. He has blogged about it, but the formal article is also available on-line, for free, at PLoS ONE, which is an online open-access journal.
It has free pictures, which is great: the articles co-author Mark Witton, is one of the best current dinosaur artists. Who has a great Flickr site with lots of his paintings and commentary.
They got written up in New Scientist. Also the Sun, a British tabloid that tweaked their human vs. azhdarchid size comparison drawing to have the human be a recognizable (I assume) British soccer star.
These critters weighed 250 kg and were able to fly, but Naish and Witton believe they did most of their hunting walking around like storks.