Compact Thescelosaurus Year Eleven

Here we are, time again for the annual check-in with The Compact Thescelosaurus. Last year, you may recall, Cretaceous crocodylomorphs joined the crocodylomorph tab. At the time, I knew I was going to go into the Cenozoic, but wasn't sure how far. In the end I opted to cover the entire Paleogene (Paleocene, Eocene, and Oligocene). This proved to be mostly members of modern groups. In fact, some of the species are assigned to living genera, although in most cases it's pretty sure that the assignment was a mistake (hence the many names in quotation marks).

And we add most of the Science Museum's crocs, including the Gavialosuchus/Thecachampsa carolinensis.

The next set will be the Neogene crocodylomorphs, and that will probably be the last big addition. (At least, I can't think of anything I especially want to add.) Extant species will not be included, as I'm feigning competence in more than enough things already and don't want to add several more disciplines. And now, on to the existing content!

As usual, it seems, a number of updates poured in during the couple of weeks after I set up the draft of this entry. There were 109 updates, but like last year they seemed to meld together. Of the 109 updates, 70 new species were added, 7 species were moved to new genera, 4 species were reinstated, 5 species were sunk, and 1 species was removed as not actually being in the group to which it had been assigned (coincidentally, it was also one of the 70 new species added).

In terms of geochronology, the Triassic did very well, thanks largely to a strong showing by non-croc pseudosuchians. There was 1 Early Triassic newcomer, 4 of Middle Triassic age, 2 of Middle–Late Triassic age, 12 of Late Triassic age, 1 of Early Jurassic age, 1 of Early–Middle Jurassic age, 3 of Middle Jurassic age, 1 of Middle–Late Jurassic age, 7 of Late Jurassic age, 10 of Early Cretaceous age, 1 of Early–Late Cretaceous age, and 27 of Late Cretaceous age.

For geography, Asia and South America tied at 19. North America followed at 13, then Europe (10), Africa (7), and India (2). China edged out Argentina 12 to 11, followed by the United States with 9 and Brazil with 4. Germany, Morocco, and Thailand tied for fifth with 3, and then there was a long tail of 2 (Canada. Colombia, Egypt, India, Mexico, and Mongolia) and 1 (Austria, Belgium, Chile, France, Japan, Niger, Norway, Romania, South Korea, Spain, United Kingdom, Uruguay, and Zimbabwe).

For taxonomy, we had:

1 new aetosaur species:
Olkasuchus walasto

6 new crocodylomorph species:
Antusuchus rionegrinus
Ctenosuchus tenuidens
Eosphorosuchus lacrimosa
Galahadosuchus jonesi
Indosinosuchus peninsularensis
Wadisuchus kassabi

3 new ichthyosauromorph species:
Ammonitritor scientiacivium
Eternauta patagonica
Jabalisaurus tethyensis

7 new mosasaur species:
Garamaudo bauciensis
Halisaurus auriculatus
Oneirosaurus caballeroi
Pluridens imelaki
Prognathodon cipactli
Thoraxion tahlequahae
Tylosaurus rex
A pretty good year for mosasaurs.

2 new phytosaur species:
Calamosuchus arenaceus
Primisuchus gillettei

4 new plesiosaur species:
Argentinonectes calafatensis
Boyacasaurus sumercei
Gondwananectes osvaldoi
Pahasapasaurus gillettei

6 new non-croc pseudosuchian species:
Carinthiasuchus kandutschi
Labrujasuchus expectatus
Shakajlura riojanensis
Sonselasuchus cedrus
Tainrakuasuchus bellator
Telkaralura coniceti
An even better year for these guys.

2 new pterosaur species:
Bakiribu waridza (but see below)
Laueropterus vitriolus
They overachieved last year; if you average them out, it's 7.5 pterosaurs per annum.

3 new basal sauropterygian species:
Lijiangosaurus yongshengensis
Nothosaurus fortihumeralis
Spatulidentatus breviceps

And 36 new nonavian dinosaur species, broken down as follows:

1 new basal saurischian species:
Ptychtherates bucculentus

13 new theropod species:
Anteavis crurilongus
Changzhousaurus sinensis
Infernogallus jamesi
Jian changmaensis
Kank australis
Kayrasaurus changliensis
Larsonvenator elegans
Manipulonyx reshetovi
Nanotyrannus lethaeus
Norellraptor barsboldi
Spinosaurus mirabilis
Tromerosaurus solumons
Xenovenator espinosai
It's a Cretaceous coelurosaur show, with Anteavis crurilongus the lone Triassic name and Spinosaurus mirabilis the lone Cretaceous non-coelurosaur.

3 new basal sauropodomorph species:
Huayracursor jaguensis
Musango matusadonaensis
Xiangyunloong fengming

11 new sauropod species:
Athenar bermani
Bicharracosaurus dionidei
Ceratocaudia antiqua
Datosaurus tocantinensis
"Mamenchisaurus" sanjiangensis
Mesetasaurus protector
Nagatitan chaiyaphumensis
Phosphatotitan khouribgaensis
Uragasaurus kalasinensis
Yantaloong lini
Yeneen houssayi
Unlike the theropods, this group is a little bit of everything in time, space, and classification.

2 new ankylosaurian species:
Nipponopelta yezoensis
Pinacosaurus hilwitnorum

1 new basal neornithischian species:
Doolysaurus huhmini

And 5 new ornithopod species:
Foskeia pelendonum
Gongshuilong fanwei
Haolong dongi
Kryptohadros kallaiae
Plesiolophus warnerensis
Ornithischians in general dropped the ball, with nary a marginocephalian in sight and just two thyreophorans.

7 species were transferred to new genera:
Chasmosaurine dinosaur Chasmosaurus russelli to Cryptarcus
Azhdarchoid pterosaur Palaeornis clifti to Rexarthuria
Ankylosaurid dinosaur Pinacosaurus mephistocephalus to Eopinacosaurus
Troodontid dinosaur Saurornitholestes robustus to Dinevenator
Tyrannosauroid dinosaur Nanotyrannus lethaeus to Gilmoretyrannus
Anhanguerid pterosaur Uktenadactylus rodriguesae to Tylodorhynchus
Rhabdodontid/ceratopsoid Zalmoxes shqiperorum to Ferenceratops

4 taxa were reinstated:
"Aublysodon" molnari (more of a paper move, recognizing there were multiple things it could be synonyms of)
Nanotyrannus lancensis
Stenopterygius longipes
Tornieria gracilis (probably a first-time instatement rather than a reinstatement)

Meanwhile, 5 species were sunk:
Erythrochampsa longipes to Protosuchus (indeterminate at species level)
Mochlodon vorosi into Ajkaceratops kozmai
Mugnipterygius huenei, Stenopterygius macrophasma, and Stenopterygius promegacephalus into Stenopterygius quadrissicus

1 species was transferred to an existing genus:
Geminiraptor suarezorum to Falcarius

And 1 species was removed:
Bakiribu waridza, from a pterosaur to a fish (at about five weeks between addition and subtraction, this may be the shortest turnover I've seen)

If you've made it this far, I congratulate you and invite you, if you're in the area, to join Mississippi National River and Recreation Area, Mississippi Park Connection, and some paleontologist (dunno who it could be) on a fossil walk at Shadow Falls this Saturday, October 17. There are three free hour-long walks scheduled, at 10 AM, noon, and 2 PM. As of this writing (a little after 5 PM Central on Monday, October 12), the 10 AM session has a waitlist and the 2 PM is probably at that point, but there are three slots open for the noon session. If you can't make it, see if you can celebrate Wednesday's National Fossil Day some other way. Our fall Park Paleontology Newsletter should be up later this week as well.