Flying Transylvanian dinosaur unearthed by scientists

Squeaky the Squirrel

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/9852067/Flying-Transylvanian-dinosaur-unearthed-by-scientists.html

The newly discovered pterorsaur, which is 68 million years old, was unearthed in Romania's Transylvanian Basin.

The creature, named Eurazhdarcho langendorfensis, had a long neck and beak and could fold up its huge wings when it needed to walk on all fours.



Dr Darren Naish, from the University of Southampton, said: "Eurazhdarcho belong to a group of pterosaurs called the azhdarchids.

"These were long-necked, long-beaked pterosaurs whose wings were strongly adapted for a soaring lifestyle. "Several features of their wing and hind limb bones show that they could fold their wings up and walk on all fours when needed.

"With a three-metre wingspan, Eurazhdarcho would have been large, but not gigantic.

"This is true of many of the animals so far discovered in Romania; they were often unusually small compared to their relatives elsewhere."

Galvasean

Bloody Telegraph, calling a pterosaur a dinosaur...

Adam Khor

Poor Eurazhdarcho has been mauled by the press so much... not only do they call it a dinosaur once and again, but reporters fail paleontology forever and say they "bet it had sharp teeth" (a reference to Transylvanian count Dracula, obviously) even tho the thing was specifically said to be an azhdarchid, therefore toothless... and as if that wasn´t bad enough, they have used Pteranodon and Guidraco skeleton photographs thus leaving everyone confused as to what it looked like...

Even the pic above is actually Lacusovagus...


That being said, this is another of those irritating animals based on very fragmentary remains...