Pterosauria

CODORNIÚ L.; GASPARINI Z

Patagonian Mesozoic Reptiles

Indiana University Press

Lugar: Bloomington & Indianapolis; Año: 2007; p. 143 - 166

To date, no specific prospecting for pterosaurs has been done in Argentina, except in San Luis Province, an area outside Patagonia. Most Patagonian pterosaur records are fragmentary and all of them were accidentally discovered. However, they come from six localities, the number of pterosaurs-bearing localities in South America. This synthesis includes new anatomical information and taxonomic interpretation for all the specimens treated. The oldest record of Pterosauria in Gondwana is a non-pterodactyloid pterosaur recently found in Chubut, suggesting that forms overflying continental environments were present at least since the Callovian (164.7 ± 4 ma). The age and bearing unit of Herbstosaurus pigmaeus is modified to the upper levels of Tithonian of the Vaca Muerta Formation. A basal pterodactyloid pterosaur found in the same unt as the most complete South American Jurassic pterosaur is reported. These Jurassic pterodactyloids came from rocks that were deposited in a marine environment. Two pterosaurs have been found in the Lower Cretaceous; they are very different in body size and quite probably represent two different clades, middle-sized non-ornithocheiroid pterodactyloid, and a pteranodontoid pterodactyloid. First specimen was found in rocks deposited in a continetal nearshore environment and the pteranodontoid specimen were deposited in a low energy marine platform environment. A very fragmentary wing bone was quite recently discovered from Upper Cretaceous rocks. Pterodaustro guinazui, although recorded outside Patagonia, is included because it is the most relevant pterosaur from southern South America. New observations of this taxon are given, and its senior synonymy with Puntanipterus globosus is confirmed. Pterosaurs of different body sizes and clades inhabited Patagonia from the Callovian to the Turonian, and were early and widely in south-western Gondwana.