A new and large ctenochasmatid pterosaur from the Solnhofen region

Ok, so new pterosaurs come out all the time and yes, the Solnhofen region of Southern Germany is home to many, many pterosaurs in general and many ctenochasmatids specifically. This probably isn’t really a surprise since they keep turning up and given the quality of the preservation and the amount of time and space that has yet to be explored in the quarries, there’s almost certainly more out there. But, it’s still nice to see another new one, and in this case it’s both near complete and really well preserved and it’s also the largest yet known pterosaur beds from this region.

So, please welcome Petrodactyle wellnhoferi. Fully laid out in wingspan it’s just over 2 m so comparable (but a bit larger than) the largest known Rhamphorhynchus and larger than any of the other pterodactyloids in the Solnhofen beds. It’s also probably a subadult animal based on the lack of fusion in the skull (which has broken up a bit) and bits of the pelvis, although the rest of the skeleton is well fused. So it does look like it would probably have some more growing to do before it died so an adult animal would probably have been even larger. By pterosaur standards of course a 2 m or so wingspan is positively modest, but aside from Dearc and some other unnamed giant bits out there, it’s one the largest pterosaurs prior to the Cretaceous and the largest pterodactyloid too. There’s really not much to say about the size beyond this, but it does suggest that there are still larger things out there to find. I’d also note that there’s a bunch of isolated large wings and other bits in the Solnhofen that are clearly from large ctenochasmatids but Petrodactyle is bigger than any of them and doesn’t appear to be the same thing based on the available measurements of the wings etc.

That statement goes to the obvious question as to this being a new taxon, and well, yes. It’s very obviously distinct from the smaller taxa that have long and low skulls with lots (often lots and lots) more teeth. It’s also not got the long neck of something like Ardeadactylus, and has different teeth and a massively different crest to Cycnorhamphus, and indeed different head to possible ctenochasmatids like Germanodactylus. Overall it’s likely something close to Cycnorhamphus given the size, the tooth arrangement and the expanded frontoparietal crest tat the back of the skull which should have given it a strong bite. That said, the thing it’s arguably most similar to is Normannognathus from the Upper Jurassic of France. Annoyingly however, this is known only from the anterior tip of a snout and jaw making it rather hard to compare but it’s generally similar in size and shape and with a mammoth crest on the nose. However, close inspection shows quite a few differences in the details of the size, shape and position of the teeth and the nasoantobital fenestra and suggests that the two are distinct (though clearly similar) and enough that it’s worthy of a name.

On that note, the name here harks back to the very first formal publication of a pterosaur where famously the ‘Pterodactyle’ was mistakenly spelled or typeset wrong as ‘Petrodactyle’ on the cover. Our name here is intended to honour that work and the progress made in pterosaur research since. (And yes, before anyone asks we did read the ICZN rules carefully and consult with several people on this and we are sure the name is fine, we’re not messing with priority with a known incorrect name, that was never a formal genus anyway, that was put forwards 200 years ago). The species name, rather obviously honours Peter Wellnhofer for his extraordinary work on the Solnhofen pterosaurs (and let’s not forget plenty of other pterosaurs too and Archaeopteryx) and he’s long overdue having a Solnhofen pterosaur named in his honour.

The taphonomy of the specimen is rather unusual and worthy of comment. Most pterosaurs from the area are either brilliant preserved and articulated, or have fallen to bits and so either missing obvious things like wings and legs, or are only preserved wings and legs. Here, the animal has fallen to bits completely, almost every bone that could come apart has, including lots of bits like the first three metacarpals that almost never separate, but it’s also still pretty much all there and with the pieces next to each other (the wing finger bones are close to the hand and upper arm which is close to the scapulocoracoid, the cranium is next to the mandible etc.). This implies that the animal sank intact (or the bits would have dropped off and been lost if it decayed in the floating phase), but that it underwent decay in situ on the bottom and presumably took a good while to be buried or the decay would not have been extensive, and it must have been a low energy system or small bits like the teeth and ribs and toe bones would have drifted off. That’s all unusual for the Solnhofen in general, but it turns up as a pattern in other vertebrate fossils (including some pterosaurs) from the Mörnsheim Formation where this thing is from.

This Formation is on top of the beds in the area and is one that’s not well studied and the local quarry that produced this pterosaur has also been responsible for a bunch of other new taxa recently and suggests that there’s a whole raft of new finds out there still to come which is exciting. Yes, there continue to be new pterosaurs from Germany, but if there’s a whole new fauna from beds that have been little explored and would add a nice temporal aspect to being able so study their evolution that’s really nice.

Of course I’d like to finish by mentioning my collaborators, and in particular René and Bruce Lauer. I imagine few readers are aware of them, but they have created the Lauer Foundation for palaeontology and education and made their collection available for research. I’m sure some readers will already be moving to type that this makes the new specimen part of a private collection and therefore shouldn’t be published on, let alone, named but this isn’t the case. The Foundation has been set up with research in mind and material from it has already been described and named in a number of venues (just not the pterosaurs before now) and they have partnered with several institutes including the Natural History Museum. In short, these specimens are very much in the public realm. I do though want to thank them for allowing me to work on the material and supporting this work (and others which are still to come) as well as the contributions to the paper (René is responsible for the all the photographs including the UV work, and Bruce the stuff on the collection history and geology). I look forwards to doing more in the future with them. 

The paper is fully open access and available online here:

Hone, D.W.E., Lauer, R., Lauer, B., and Spindler, F. 2023. Petrodactyle wellnhoferi (gen. et sp. nov.): A new and large ctenochasmatid pterosaur from the Late Jurassic of Germany. Palaeontologica Electronica.