Nearly 200 million years ago, large flying reptile species or pterosaurs, used to fly above dinosaurs. Scientists discovered the jaw of a pterosaur in Arizona sometime in 2013; however, now they have ascertained that it is an entirely new species. They made this discovery with the help of modern scanning technology.
The reptile species has been named as Eotephradactylus mcintireae which means “ash-winged dawn goddess”. The volcanic ash is said to have preserved the reptile’s bones on the ancient riverbed. The creature was named by a team of researchers from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC.
Experts predict that the fossil of the pterosaur is 209 million years old and currently believe it to be the oldest pterosaur to be discovered in North America. The jaw of the pterosaur is just one part of the collection of fossils found in the archaeological site; the fossils include bones, teeth, fish scales, and even fossilised dung (which is known as coprolites).
“The bones of Triassic pterosaurs are small, thin, and often hollow, so they get destroyed before they get fossilised,” Dr Kligman told the BBC. The site area was a riverbed more than 200 million years ago; scales, bones, and other signs of life were progressively trapped and preserved by layers of sediment.
To understand more about the creature, experts studied its teeth to narrow down what the seagull-sized reptile would have eaten during its existence. Dr Kligman told the publication that they have an unusually high degree of wear at their tips. This evidence shows that the creature was feeding on something with hard body parts. Their most likely prey were primitive fish that would have had hard scale armour covering them.
The Triassic pterosaur was discovered in the desert landscape amid ancient rocks in the present day Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona. Scientists say that the site where they found the creature’s fossils had preserved the “snapshot” of the ecosystem. They also found groups of animals that now are extinct. The other ancient creatures that they found include ancient armoured crocodile relatives and amphibians. And some creatures that can be recognised today, like frogs and turtles.
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