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Dino
Expert Essay

BY: DAVID NGUYEN DUC

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Dinosaurs"

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We Know!"

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Kinds of Pterosaurs"

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Our Habitat and What Do We Eat?"

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Habitat"

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Life and Death"

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Body"

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Parts of the Head"

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Quetzalcoatlus northropi"

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Can we fly?"

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We saw it"

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Cool Facts"

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Sources "

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Dinosaurs!
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Is it a bird, is it a plane, is it a rocket! NO, NO, and NO! its a flying reptile,
Pterosaur. Pterosaurs are also referred to as pterodactyls. Pterosaurs had a wide
range of sizes, with wingspans ranging from 250 mm (10 in) at their smallest. This
dinosaur is actually a reptile. Pterosaurs lived during the Mesozoic Era, the Age of
Reptiles. Lets begin.

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We Know!!
Georges Cuvier first thought was that pterosaurs were flying monsters in
1801, and so he invented the name Ptero-dactyle in 1809. Pterodactyl
continued to be popular but it was wrong because it applied to all members of the
Pterosauria. Palaeontogists now avoid using pterodactyl and prefer the term
Pterosaur. An easier explanation is that the pterodactyl is the common name for
the winged creatures but the actual and most proper name is pterosaurs which I will
be using through this essay.

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Kinds of Pterosaurs!

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Pterosaurs whose members are popularly known as pterodactyls. Like all

pterosaurs, Pterodactyls had wings formed by a skin and muscle membrane. There
are lots of pterosaurs so here is a chart. "

Name Of Pterosaurs

maximum wingspan of greater than 5

metres 16 feet

Hatzegopteryx thambema

910 m (3033 ft)

Quetzalcoatlus northropi

1011 m (3336 ft)

Tropeognathus mesembrinus

8.2 m (27 ft)

Geosternbergia maysei

7.25 m (24 ft)

Arambourgiania philadelphiae

7 m (23 ft)

Coloborhynchus capito

7 m (23 ft)

Moganopterus zhuiana

7 m (23 ft)

Pteranodon longiceps

6.25 m (20.5 ft)

Tupuxuara longicristatus

6 m (20 ft)

Santanadactylus araripensis

5.7 m (19 ft)

Cearadactylus atrox

5.5 m (18 ft)

Caulkicephalus trimicrodon

5 m (16 ft)

Istiodactylus latidens

5 m (16 ft)

Lacusovagus magnificens

5 m (16 ft)

Liaoningopterus

5 m (16 ft)

Phosphatodraco mauritanicus

5 m (16 ft)

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This data was got from http://en.wikipedia.org/

Our Habitat and What Do We Eat?!

Habitat

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Pterosaurs lived during the Mesozoic Era, which is the Age of Reptiles which
makes sense because the Pterosaur is a reptile. But if Pterosaur was alive they
would be living in Germany, France, England, Tanzania, and Africa, The pterosaurs
used to be on the lands that is known now as Germany, France, England, Tanzania,
and Africa.

Food!

So first I will be talking about what do the Pterosaur eat including me, Bob the fish.
Pterosaur are carnivores. They ate fish (which they caught at the surface of the oceans),
mollusks, crabs, perhaps plankton, insects, and scavenged dead animals on land because they
can fly over them and just scoop them up or eat them on ground but they occasionally ate fruits.

Run Bob, otherwise a

Pterosaur will EAT YOU!

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Life and Death

" Everything has to die and so did the Pterosaur. Pterosaurs are
known to have been eaten by theropods. A Palaeontologist Eric Buffetaut talked
about an early Cretaceous fossil with three parts of a pterosaur spine in it. The fossil of a
pterosaur with a broken tooth of a Spinosaur stuck in it which probably meant that the
Spinosaur had a fight with the pterosaur or you could also consider that they were friends
who were biting each other.""

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Life is really valuable for pterosaurs because their eggs are very rare. The first
known pterosaur egg was found in Liaoning. Pterosaurs buried their eggs, like now
day crocodiles and turtles. Egg-burying would have been really good to the early evolution
of pterosaurs, it was really good because that way the reproduction would limit a lot of
predators so there would be more pterosaurs. That method also meant that this reptile would
be limited to live in places. Baby pterosaurs unlike birds were able to fly soon after birth
which is akward because they werent that big. We know that because pterosaurss
wings were preserved.

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Body!
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The pterosaur wing is divided into three
basic parts (you can look at the picture on the
right). The first part is called the propatagium.
The propatagium is the part of the wing that is in
the front the most from the 3 parts. The
brachiopatagium which is also known as the arm
organism/membrane. Combining the tail, which is
called the uropatagium; the length of this organism is not certain though. "
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A bone special to pterosaurs, known as the pteroid. The pteroid is connected to the wrist
Some scientist say that the pteroid is pointed forward, which makes the part face forward."
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In conclusion the scientist found out the pteroid is actually a bone, rather than cartilage.
The location of the pteroid is not known for sure yet but scientist say that it might have been under
the forearm of the pterosaur."

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Parts of the Head!

Lots of pterosaurs have skulls that the teeth arent a lot like
us the teeth are basically like needles but it is made of a different
material. The beak is small part of the jaw tips and does not
involve the teeth. Some advanced beaked forms were toothless,
such as the pteranodonts and azhdarchids, and had larger, more
extensive, and more bird-like beaks."
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Pterosaurs are well known for their crests. The first and
perhaps best known of these crest is the distinctive backwardpointing crest of some Pteranodon species (Pteranodon is a kind
of pterosaurs)."
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Some pterosaurs had hair-like slender thread known as pycnofibers on the
head and body. Pterosaurs had pycnofiber coats. Pycnofibers were not true hair as
seen in mammals now days, but a unique part of the body that developed a similar
appearance as mammal hair."
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This skull is from a Tupuxuara species.

THIS TOOTHLESS REPTILE IS A QUETZALCOATLUS

NORTHROPI.
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Quetzalcoatlus northropi!

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Quetzalcoatlus northropi is one of the largest known flying animals of all time. It was a
member of the Azhdarchidae, a family of advanced toothless pterosaurs with unusually long,
stiffened necks which is awkward because ."
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Can we fly?!

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Some researchers and scientists think that the Quetzalcoatlus northropi was a reptile that
flew by slow, soaring flight, others have said that their flight was fast and made for going fast which
is totally different. So the question is, who is right? If the researchers didnt think that the
Quetzalcoatlus northropi didnt fly either fast nor slow then they thought that the Quetzalcoatlus
northropi didnt fly at all. But almost all the other researchers think that the Quetzalcoatlus northropi
couldnt fly. So back to the question does the Quetzalcoatlus northropi fly fast and dynamic or does
it soar slowly?A professor, and a British palaeontologist, learned more about the flightlessness in
large pterosaurs. In conclusion to the two researchers, they found out that the Quetzalcoatlus
northropi was able to fly up to 80 miles an hour for 7 to 10 days at altitudes of 15,000 feet which is
amazing because 10 days is a lot of time and especially if you spend it in the breeze. They learned
all of this by knowing the wingspan, body weight, and aerodynamics also using a good computer
program which helped them a lot. So in conclusion is that the Quetzalcoatlus northropi was able to
fly slow, soaring flight, but maybe some other small pterosaurs could fly fast and dynamic but that
is all for the amazing Quetzalcoatlus northropi.

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We saw it!
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This is a photo was thought to be token by the people in the olden days but no one
payed much attention because of the war. But now the question is: Is this photo
real? Some people say that the wing look like canoes but some think they are real.
But there is no real answer to this question yet but personally I think this photo is
fake because first of all I think the Pteranodon was able to escape some bullets from
the slow guns in the days, also I am surprised that there is no blood in sight and
how nothing is broken so in my conclusion I think they made the Pteranodon.

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Cool facts !
Cool Facts

Pterosaurs' closest living relatives are two vastly different

animals: Crocodiles and birds.

There were lots of different

types of Pterosaurs living in
lots of parts of the Earth.
Some were small like a
crow, some were as big as
hang gliders!

A fossil of a baby
Pterosaurs was found and it
was only one inch long, but
it could already fly!

Pterosaurs
Many
pterosaurs
were small
but they still
had large
wingspans which
could exceeded 9 m
(30 ft).

Pterosaurs
flew long
distances using
large, light-weight
wings. Unlike now
day airplanes.
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Sources !
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1)

http://www.enchantedlearning.com/

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2) http://www.britannica.com/
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3) http://en.wikipedia.org/
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4) http://mentalfloss.com/
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5) http://someinterestingfacts.net/
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6) http://kidsdigdinos.com/
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7) http://www.livescience.com/
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8) http://oceansofkansas.com/fieldguide4.html
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9) http://www.modernpterosaur.com/
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Glossary

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component- constituting part of a larger whole; constituent"

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synonyms- part, piece, bit, constituent, element, ingredient;"

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controversial- giving rise or likely to give rise to controversy or

public disagreement."

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Spinosaur- Another dinosaur (If you want to know more about

the Spinosaur check out Lennards or Alecs Expert Paper)."
Elongate- Make (something) longer, especially unusually so in
relation to its width."

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