I can’t be the only person with a soft spot for certain anatomical features and I really do like unguals. They are after all, an important (perhaps the most important) between an animal and it’s environment and we see numerous adaptations and modifications to unguals accordingly. Sauropods are rather cool in this regard often having rather outsized unguals on the manus or pes that in some cases look rather more suited to a theropod. This is from the Mamenchisaurus mount in Chengdu University of Technology though as I don’t have the full original set of photos I took I have to go by memory and I think this was a pedal claw.
Ungual’s are pretty awesome indeed! I might also add, that teeth are another ons of those wonderful things that come in contact with the environment, and I reckon teeth are pretty important too. Great post!
Teeth are, of course, very important and provide the main link between and animal and their food. I guess my point would be that teeth do get a lot of attention in the literature, but claws rather less so.
Very cool! Lovely post. That’s a heck of a claw!