<h1>Scientists tell you what pterosaurs ate 190 million years ago</h1>
The name Two-Toothed Pterodactyl must be unfamiliar to you. If you've seen the movie Jurassic World, you'll be impressed by the pterosaurs that attack humans in the film, and the pterosaurs with big heads and fangs are bidonted pterosaurs. Bidontosaurus was ugly in appearance and looked like a fish-eating villain, but paleontologists have come up with a new result by studying the microstructure of their teeth, that is, diplodontates do not eat fish.
<h1>Super Mary's discovery</h1>
Photo note: Portrait of Mary Anning, picture from the internet
Although most people are not familiar with the dipterodontis, it is a very historical archaeology. The two-toothed pterosaur was discovered by Super Mario, who is not the plumber in the game with a red hat and suspender pants, she is the world's most famous fossil hunter. "Super Mary", whose real name is Mary Anning, lived in England in the early 19th century. Mary's father died when she was very young, and in order to supplement the family, she often went to the coast of Dorset to collect fossils to sell for money, and the famous ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs were picked up by her.
One day in December 1828, Mary came to the shore again in the face of the sea breeze, this time discovering a fossil in a limestone block that had never been seen before. Mary, of course, did not know what animal the fossil belonged to, and she sold it as usual, and the fossil was soon handed over to William Buckland. Buckland was a well-known scholar, and he named the first dinosaur named by mankind, Megalodon. Buckland studied the fossils and believed that the animal was a Pterodactylus , because at that time humans only named pterosaurs , so all fossils like pterosaurs were considered pterosaurs.
Image note: Mary found a pterosaur fossil, picture from the internet
After 30 years, the experts who could really identify the fossils got two new fossils, and this person was Richard Owen. After looking at the new fossils, Owen discovered that they were the same animal as Buckland's pterodactyl, but certainly not pterosaurs. Based on the two distinct teeth in the stone bone, Owen named the pterosaur Dimorphodon, which means "two different types of teeth."
Image note: Irving, the name of the two-toothed pterosaur, image from the internet
<h1>Ugly flying monsters</h1>
In the many types of pterosaur families, the two-toothed pterosaur is really not very famous, it is neither huge nor beautiful, if it were not for the movie "Jurassic Century", perhaps many people still do not know this pterodactyl today. Don't be fooled by the movie "Jurassic World", the two-toothed pterosaur is actually very small, and the open wings are only 1.5 meters, which is not a great threat to us humans.
Illustration: The two-toothed pterosaur that attacked the hero in Jurassic World, picture from the Internet
Illustration: The two-toothed pterosaur setting of Jurassic World, picture from the Internet
Picture note: Restoration of the cute two-toothed pterosaur, picture from the network
Don't look at the size of the two-toothed pterosaur, but it has a large head. The head of the two-toothed pterosaur was more than 20 centimeters long, longer than our entire hand, and the head was quite tall. There are two different types of teeth in the mouth of the bidontosaur: one is pointed and long like a nail, growing on the front of the upper and lower jaws, and the other is thin and small, densely arranged in the back of the lower jaw. Two distinctly different teeth became the origin of the name Diplodontosaurus. The tall head and fangs that came out made the two-toothed pterosaur lookless, and it was a carnivore at a glance.
Note: The head of the diplodont pterosaur is restored, picture from the internet
Illustration: Skeletal line diagram of the two-type toothed pterosaur, with a huge head, the picture comes from the network
Illustration: Restoration of the two-type toothed pterosaur, picture from the network
Compared with the large head, the body of the two-toothed pterosaur was very thin, the wings were not very wide, and there was a slender tail behind it, and there was a diamond-shaped bone piece at the end of the tail, which proved that it was a primitive pterosaur.
<h1>I don't eat fish, only bugs and meat</h1>
Diplodontosaurus lived in the early Jurassic Period, 190 million years ago, and because of the large number of marine life fossils in the same strata where its fossils were found, paleontologists believe that it lived by the sea and fed on fish. Diplodocus flew on the seashore and picked up small fish from the surface of the sea from time to time has become the most standard impression of it, they are like puffins living in coastal areas today.
Illustration: Fishing diplodocus, picture from the web
Diplodocus is thought to resemble puffins, image from the web
Did diplodonts really feed on fish, as people speculate? Bestwick, a paleontologist from the University of Leicester in the UNITED Kingdom, decided to find out. Using a focusing microscope, Bestvik obtained a 3D image of the teeth of a diplodontosaur with very clear wear. Later, Bestvik collected the wear and tear left on the teeth of today's animals such as lizards and crocodiles when eating different foods, and then compared the teeth of diplodont pterosaurs in a statistical way, and he found that the feeding habits of bidontate pterosaurs were completely different from previous estimates, and bidontates fed on insects and terrestrial vertebrates (lizards, etc.).
When we understand the feeding habits of diplodocus, we can better restore its way of life, it seems that this pterosaur did not fly on the sea all day, they spent more time on the forest floor, running on all fours to chase prey.
Illustration: Fossil teeth of Diplodontosaurus, picture from the internet
Illustration: A two-toothed pterosaur flying in the forest, picture from the internet
At the annual meeting of the Paleontological Society in London, Bestvik presented his own research, which showed the recipes of diplodonts, and the idea of using tooth surface wear to judge the dietary habits of paleontologists is very unique, and in the future, with this method, we can uncover the secrets of more paleontological diets.
Resources:
1."Dimorphodon." In: Cranfield, Ingrid (ed.). The Illustrated Directory of Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Creatures. London: Salamander Books, Ltd. Pp. 288-291.
2.Wellnhofer, Peter (1996) [1991]. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Pterosaurs. New York: Barnes and Noble Books. p. 71. ISBN 0-7607-0154-7.
3.Padian. K. (1995). "Pterosaurs and Typology: Archetypal Physiology in the Owen-Seeley Dispute of 1870", In: Sarjeant, W.A.S. & Halstead, L.N. (ed.) Vertebrate fossils and the evolution of scientific concepts: writings in tribute to Beverly Halstead, by some of his many friends, Gordon & Breach 1995
Image / Network (Intrusion and Deletion)
Text / Paleontological Exploration (Jiang Hong)
Typography / Paleontological exploration