https://www.theguardian.com/science...haul-egg-fossils-ancient-flying-reptile-china
A discovery in northwestern China of hundreds of fossilized pterosaur eggs is providing fresh understanding of the flying reptiles that lived alongside the dinosaurs, including evidence that their babies were born flightless and needed parental care.
Scientists said on Thursday they unearthed 215 eggs of the fish-eating Hamipterus tianshanensis – a species whose adults had a crest atop an elongated skull, pointy teeth and a wingspan of more than 11ft (3.5m) – including 16 eggs containing partial embryonic remains.
Fossils of hundreds of male and female adult Hamipterus individuals were found alongside juveniles and eggs at the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region site, making this Cretaceous Period species that lived 120m years ago perhaps the best understood of all pterosaurs.
I was wondering how so many individuals died and got trapped at the same time, then lower down the article...
They suspect the eggs and some juvenile and adult individuals were washed away from a nesting site in a storm and into the lake, where they were preserved and later fossilized.
A discovery in northwestern China of hundreds of fossilized pterosaur eggs is providing fresh understanding of the flying reptiles that lived alongside the dinosaurs, including evidence that their babies were born flightless and needed parental care.
Scientists said on Thursday they unearthed 215 eggs of the fish-eating Hamipterus tianshanensis – a species whose adults had a crest atop an elongated skull, pointy teeth and a wingspan of more than 11ft (3.5m) – including 16 eggs containing partial embryonic remains.
Fossils of hundreds of male and female adult Hamipterus individuals were found alongside juveniles and eggs at the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region site, making this Cretaceous Period species that lived 120m years ago perhaps the best understood of all pterosaurs.
I was wondering how so many individuals died and got trapped at the same time, then lower down the article...
They suspect the eggs and some juvenile and adult individuals were washed away from a nesting site in a storm and into the lake, where they were preserved and later fossilized.
