#archosaur
Ideally these two spreads would be part of a much longer comic narrative where the pterosaur spirals into anxiety after the bird informs it that it has nothing to worry about, for the pterosaur is already dead.
Also, the bone diagrams are not peer-reviewed! Nothing I create is peer-reviewed. Always do your own research. Thank you.
[img id]
Page 1
Panel 1: Depicts a dinosaur evolving into a bird on the left, and into a pterosaur on the right.
Narration: This is incorrect!
Panel 2: Depicts a dinosaur first evolving into a pterosaur, then evolving into a bird.
Narration: This is also incorrect!
Panel 3: Depicts a diagram on the left and a small scene on the right. The diagram shows an archosaur evolving into a dinosaur, then a bird. The archosaur evolves into a pterosaur. The scene depicts the anxious pterosaur on a small beach.
Archosaur: (waving at dinosaur) hello
Dinosaur: (waving at archosaur) hey
Bird: (fluffing up happily) much better
Pterosaur: (panicking) b…but… then why am I fuzzy and batlike
Page 2
Panel 1: Depicts a bird, a pterosaur, and a bat flying in front of the goshdarned sun itself.
Narration: It’s the power of…Convergent evolution! Sometimes similar attributes arise in species that aren’t descended from one another.
Panel 3: Depicts a labeled cheese with mold on it, a ripe peach, and a wad of dryer lint.
Narration: Other fuzzy things that aren’t descended from pterosaurs.
Page 3
A full-bleed, single panel page covered by a sky background. Floating in the clouds are skeletal diagrams of a bird and a pterosaur. The actual bird and pterosaur flutter nearby to provide commentary.
Narration: But how do we know this is a case of convergent evolution?
Bird: the clues are in the bones
Narration: Compare these two skeletons. What observations can you make about them?
Pterosaur: …besides the grim inevitability of death
Page 4
This page has five panels floating on a sky background.
Panel 1: Depicts an x-ray of the pterosaur’s wing.
Narration: Since both animals fly, what do you notice about their wing structure?
Panel 2: Depicts an x-ray of the bird’s wing. No text.
Panel 3: Depicts an x-ray of the pterosaur’s pelvis.
Narration: We can also look at other parts for clues, such as their hip bones!
Panel 4: Depicts an x-ray of the bird’s pelvis. The pterosaur and the bird are perched on this panel.
Bird: relax
Bird: everyone has bones inside
Pterosaur: no its morbid!!!
Narration: (Depicted next to a small pencil on paper) Try drawing or tracing the bones to see their differences!
The final two image graphics in this post are the pages depicted earlier, but put together in full-spread form so that readers can envision how it would look in a comic book. [end id]
Saurosuchus
Mounted specimen from Ischigualasto Provincial Park, San Juan, Argentina
Reconstructed model from the Titanes de Ischigualasto (Titans of Ischigualasto) exhibit while at the Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
When: Late Triassic (~231 to 226 million years ago)
Where: Argentina
What: Saurosuchus is a very large basal member of the crocodile lineage within the Archosauria. It lived in what is now Argentina during the late Triassic, where it was a dominante apex predator, reaching lengths of up to 23 feet (~7 meters). A good deal of this length was its massive skull filled with pointy recurving teeth. Saurosuchus is a member of the Rauisuchia, one of the first branches to come off of the Crurotarsi (crocodile line archosaurs) lineage. Like other rauisuchians Saurosuchus had an erect leg posture, you can see this in the model above, it looks very much like a large crocodile (albiet with more dinosaur looking like head on), but its legs are directly underneath its body, not sprawling out like in modern crocodiles. This posture is the same as in mammals and dinosaurs, but was accomplished in a different way. Mammals and dinosaurs modify the femur itself for erect posture, but in rauisuchians it was the pelvis that was transformed. Saurosuchus was a fully terrestrial creature capable of fast speeds as it hunted its prey (including the much smaller dinosaurs) in the ancient flood plane.
Saurosuchus fossils are from the Ischigualasto formation (and national park!) in Argentina. This area is open to the public and is more popularly called the Valle de la Luna (Valley of the Moon). Not only do basal crocodile line archosaurs come from this formation, but some of the oldest dinosaurs as well. These animals, which would go on to dominate later in the Mesozoic, were a minor part of the fauna. The Triassic here was dominated by rhynchosaurs andcynodonts, these groups would both suffer great losses during the end Triassic extinction event.
Post link
