The remains of a large flying reptile that roamed Earth’s skies 100 million years ago during the age of the dinosaurs have been uncovered by researchers.
The prehistoric creature is a pterosaur, a group of animals that appeared more than 200 million years ago and flourished until the mass extinction event around 66 million years ago—which wiped out their dinosaur relatives, in addition to many other forms of life.
Pterosaurs and dinosaurs both belong to a larger group known as the archosaurs, which also counts birds and crocodiles as members. Pterosaurs are notable for being the first vertebrates—or animals with backbones—to evolve flight capabilities
This week, a team of paleontologists announced the discovery of pterosaur remains from the province of Rio Negro in the Patagonia region of southern Argentina.
An illustration of the pterosaur represented by a single vertebra bone found on the banks of the Ezequiel Ramos Mexía Reservoir in Rio Negro Province, Argentina. This prehistoric reptile belongs to a group known as Azhdarchidae that includes the largest flying animals of all time. Gabriel Lio/Laboratorio de Anatomía Comparada y Evolución de los Vertebrados
Researchers found a single neck vertebra bone on the banks of the Ezequiel Ramos Mexía Reservoir—a huge man-made lake located along Rio Negro’s border with the neighboring province of Neuquén.
The incomplete vertebra bone, described in a journal article published in The Magazine of the Argentine Museum of Natural Sciences, was discovered in rocks from a geological formation that dates back to between 100 million and 90 million years ago.
The authors of the latest study determined that the bone represents a pterosaur from the family called Azhdarchidae. This family of pterosaurs contains the largest known flying animals of all time, including Quetzalcoatlus, which had a wingspan of up to 40 feet and could stand as tall as a modern-day giraffe.
“Azhdarchids are gigantic but very [slender] flying reptiles. They have very long beaks and a notably elongated and narrow neck,” Federico Agnolin, one of the authors of the latest study, affiliated with the Laboratory of Comparative Anatomy and Vertebrate Evolution (LACEV) at the Argentine Museum of Natural Sciences “Bernardino Rivadavia”—among other institutions—told Newsweek.
Azhdarchid bones are very fragile, thus it is difficult for them to be preserved, according to Agnolin.
“Any discovery of fossil remains of this family is important, even if it is a fragment of their bones,” Agnolin said in a statement to Argentine media, Mejor Informado reported.
Given that only one vertebra was uncovered, the researchers couldn’t assign a species to the remains.
“Regrettably, the specimen is not enough to put a name to it. We are waiting to find additional material in the field,” Agnolin told Newsweek.
But the researchers were able to report that the fossil represents the oldest record of the Azhdarchidae family on the South American continent.
Several other azhdarchid species have previously been documented in Argentina, such as Aerotitan sudamericanus—also from the province of Rio Negro but much more recent, living around 70 million years ago—and Thanatosdrakon amaru from the province of Mendoza, which roamed the skies around 85 million years ago. The creature from the banks of the Ezequiel Ramos Mexía Reservoir, however, dates back even further.
“In this way, the record of this amazing family of flying reptiles extends between 10 and 15 million years in South America and invites us to continue exploring in search of more remains of these incredible prehistoric beings,” the LACEV said in a Facebook post.
Unlike the aforementioned species, the animal represented by the new vertebra was relatively small in comparison to many other pterosaurs in the Azhdarchidae family, although it would still have been large in absolute terms. The researchers suggest that it likely had a wingspan similar to that of modern-day condors—among the largest birds in the world capable of flight.
The latest discovery constitutes an “important addition” to the knowledge of azhdarchids in South America, according to the study.
“The finding sheds light on the diversity of azhdarchids, suggesting a longer and more varied history than previously believed,” Agnolin said.