Rhamphorhynchidae

Rhamphorhynchidae is a group of early pterosaurs named after Rhamphorhynchus, that lived in the Late Jurassic. The family Rhamphorhynchidae was named in 1870 by Harry Govier Seeley. Members of the group possess no more than 11 pairs of teeth in the rostrum, a deltopectoral crest that is constricted at the base but expanded at the distal end, and a bent phalange on the fifth toe.

Rhamphorhynchidae

Ryan Somma · CC BY-SA 2.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
BreviquartossaPBDB
Diet
piscivorePBDB, for Pterosauria
Life habit
volantPBDB, for Pterosauria
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
marinePBDB, for Pterosauria

Time the record covers

At least 49 million years on record.

The record covers at least 192.9 Mya to 143.1 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 201.4 Mya to 137.05 Mya.

Late Triassic — about 0 of 114 occurrencesEarly Jurassic — about 39 of 114 occurrencesEarly JurassicMiddle Jurassic — about 22 of 114 occurrencesMiddle JurassicLate Jurassic — about 51 of 114 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 2 of 114 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous203–200 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences200–198 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences198–196 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences196–194 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences194–192 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences185–183 Mya — about 37 occurrences171–169 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences169–167 Mya — about 6 occurrences167–165 Mya — about 10 occurrences165–163 Mya — about 4 occurrences163–160 Mya — about 3 occurrences160–158 Mya — about 3 occurrences158–156 Mya — about 3 occurrences156–154 Mya — about 2 occurrences154–151 Mya — about 5 occurrences151–149 Mya — about 10 occurrences149–147 Mya — about 13 occurrences147–145 Mya — about 11 occurrences145–142 Mya — about 2 occurrences142–140 Mya — about 1 occurrence140–138 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences138–136 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences192.9 Mya143.1 Mya203 Mya136 Mya

114 occurrences of Rhamphorhynchidae on record, most of them in the Late Jurassic. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

114 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

40 formations

Posidonia Shale — 49.92°N, 11.47°EPosidonia Shale — 49.94°N, 11.57°EPosidonia Shale — 48.65°N, 9.53°EPosidonia Shale — 48.75°N, 9.65°EPosidonia Shale — 50.09°N, 11.02°EPosidonia Shale — 50.16°N, 10.95°EPosidonia Shale — 52.36°N, 10.71°EPosidonia Shale — 48.21°N, 8.77°EPosidonia Shale — 48.25°N, 8.81°EPosidonia Shale — 48.65°N, 9.57°EPosidonia Shale — 52.27°N, 10.69°ESolnhofener Plattenkalk — 48.91°N, 11.38°ESolnhofen — 48.90°N, 11.17°ESolnhofen — 48.91°N, 11.14°ETiaojishan — 41.32°N, 119.24°ETiaojishan — 40.87°N, 119.99°ETiaojishan — 40.48°N, 119.37°EOxford Clay — 52.56°N, 0.18°WOxford Clay — 51.75°N, 1.24°WOxford Clay — 51.75°N, 1.18°WTaynton Limestone — 51.85°N, 1.43°WLourinhã — 39.85°N, 8.62°WLourinhã — 39.22°N, 9.34°WCotswold Slate — 51.02°N, 3.25°WCotswold Slate — 51.90°N, 1.83°WPainten — 48.92°N, 11.58°EPainten — 49.02°N, 11.98°EJagua — 22.69°N, 83.65°WAltmühltal — 48.99°N, 11.20°ELiegende Bankkalk — 48.12°N, 8.87°EKsar Metlili — 32.70°N, 3.22°WShaximiao — 29.41°N, 104.85°EChipping Norton Limestone — 51.99°N, 1.80°WBalabansai — 41.33°N, 72.25°EForest Marble — 50.71°N, 2.78°WSharp's Hill — 51.91°N, 1.58°WItat — 55.65°N, 89.18°EQigu — 43.55°N, 87.26°ECabaços — 39.91°N, 8.95°WAlcobaça — 39.70°N, 8.80°WTendaguru — 9.70°S, 39.23°EReuchenette — 47.42°N, 7.11°E

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The named rock units Rhamphorhynchidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 16 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 11 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Rhamphorhynchidae and its relatives

Late Jurassic

Where Rhamphorhynchidae and its relatives were recorded in the Late Jurassic.

Found in the same rock

803 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 97 sites for Rhamphorhynchidae, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

49 references

Each of the 114 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 37 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Rhamphorhynchidae

Credit
Ryan Somma
Licence
CC BY-SA 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Rhamphorhynchidae was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itBreviquartossa through timeFormations of the Late JurassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Seeley 1870)