GARBLED RUMOURS ON IRITATOR!

["D.W.Naish" <dwn194@soton.ac.uk>]

An aspect of the description and naming of _Iritator_ (_Irritator_?) that seems
not to have been mentioned here is the initial confusion surrounding the beast's
identity, and resulting in it's generic name. I have just been informed (you're
now an international star Chris Webb) that a recent radio show on Radio 4 over
here featured a guy from Portsmouth (Eng.) University instrumental in the
description of this new form.

Things are confusing, because apparently the fossil had been altered by locals
peddlers as to make it more appealing to potential buyers. I understand that the
skull was lengthened and the teeth altered, and consequently initial suspicions
were that the skull belonged to a pterosaur. Based on scanty postcrania, it was
then realised that the skull was far too large and heavily constructed to allow
flight - hence subsequent rumours of a flightless, terrestrial pterosaur (though
rumours I hear of such are from China.. but confusion is rife). On this subject,
someone on the list recently mentioned a pterosaur-like aspect to the skull...
do they know anything else about this? 

Only after realisation of the fact that the material had been altered to 'make
it look better' (hence generic name, it is implied), and after a conference of
(presumably) vertebrate palaeontologist, was the material deemed theropodan, and
moreover representative of at least a new family. 

I haven't yet seen the description of this animal - new publications take 2 or
more months to come through here (I'm still waiting for the ish of Can. Jour.
Earth Sci. featuring the scavenged azdarchid), so further discussion certainly
wouldn't go unappreciated.

Ahh, where would we be without the rumour mill? A lot bloody less confused,
that's where!!

A new exhibition of robotic pterosaur has just opened up somewhere in the north
of this country (England if you don't know). The models were displayed on a
recent TV show and were pretty darn good, bar the jerky and silly looking
robotic movements. They are all lifesize, are furry and have multicolourd beaks.
?Alison Fothergill provided a bit of further info, and basically said a bit
about fur, metabolism, colours and beaks. The biggest robot is a fine
_Pteranodon stenbergi_ in gliding posture. Others weren't mentioned by name, but
I saw _Anurognathus_, _Dimorphodon_, _Tropeognathus_ (but possibly
_Criorhynchus_) and _Dsungaripterus_. I'll wager that _Pterodaustro_,
_Rhamphorhynchus_ and maybe _Ctenochasma_ were there too. So, anyone out there
know exactly where the exhibition is??

OK, so I forgot that my _Hyperolius_ has bright pink flash markings.

AMAZING ARNIE-ISMS NO. 4

"He'll live"

DARREN NAISH