Name: Tanystropheus
(Long strap).
Phonetic: Tan-ee-stro-fee-us .
Named By: Christian Erich Hermann von Meyer -
1852.
Synonyms: Tribelesodon, Procerosaurus.
Classification: Chordata, Reptilia, Diapsida,
Archosauromorpha, Prolacertiformes, Tanystrophidae.
Species: T. conspicuous (type),T.
antiquus, T. longobardicus, T. hydroides.
Type: Carnivore.
Size: 6 meters long.
Known locations: Europe, Middle East and China.
Time period: Mid Triassic.
Fossil representation: Several Skeletons, many
preserved juveniles from Besano Formationin in Italy.
Taking
up
half of its total body length, Tanystropheus’s
neck is almost
inconceivable. Indeed, when Francesco Bassani discovered
Tanystropheus remains in 1886 (although he named
it
Tribelesodon), he conceived the extra long neck
vertebrae as the
wing bones of a pterosaur.
It was not until later that the mistake
was realised and Tribelesodon became a synonym of Tanystropheus.
Analysis
of Tanystropheus
remains and the areas that they are recovered from strongly suggests a
life spent on the Triassic shorelines. The teeth are adapted in a way
that would enable them to easily snatch marine prey like fish, and
the elongated neck would have given it significant each over and under
the water. The legs however appear to be more suited for terrestrial
locomotion. An interesting feature is that the front legs are shorter
than the rear, suggesting that Tanystropheus may
have pitched itself
forward at the water’s edge for feeding.
For
hunting strategy, it is
possible that Tanystropheus visited tidal pools
that would have been
re-stocked with fresh prey items at high tide that would then in turn
be trapped in the pools when the tide receded. This would provide a
naturally trapped and easily sought out food supply.
In
2006 Dr. Silvio
Renesto discovered a specimen in Switzerland that appears to display
the impressions of soft tissue. One of the main discoveries here is a
skin impression that shows Tanystropheus did not
have overlapping
scales. The other discovery is a dark impression that suggests that
there was a significant development of muscle to the rear of
Tanystropheus. This counter weight of muscle would
have shifted the
centre of mass back allowing the neck to move in a more balanced
manner. It may have also had a secondary function of giving
Tanystropheus great strength to grip onto shoreline
rocks.
Further reading
- �bersicht �ber die Reptilien der Trias" [Review of the Reptilia of
the Triassic] - F. von Huene - 1902.
- A new specimen of Tanystropheus (Reptilia
Protorosauria) from the
Middle Triassic of Switzerland and the ecology of the genus - S.
Renesto - 2005.
- Tanystropheus longobardicus (Reptilia
Protorosauria):
Re-interpretations of the anatomy based on new specimens from the
Middle Triassic of Besano (Lombardy, northern Italy). - Memorie della
Societa Italiana di Scienze Naturali e del Museo Civico di Storia
Naturale di Milano. 35 (3). - Stefania Nossotti - 2007.
- Tanystropheus cf. T. Longobardicus
from the early Late Triassic of
Guizhou Province, southwestern China. - Journal of Vertebrate
Paleontology. 30 (4): 1082–1089. - Olivier Rieppel, Da-Yong Jiang,
Nicholas C. Fraser, Wei-Cheng Hao, Ryosuke Motani, Yuan-Lin Sun
& Zuo-Yu Sun - 2009.
- Land or water: using taphonomic models to determine the lifestyle of
the Triassic protorosaur Tanystropheus (Diapsida,
Archosauromorpha). -
Palaeobiodiversity and Palaeoenvironments. 98 (2): 243–258. - S. R.
Beardmore & H. Furrer - 2017.
- Evidences for a semi aquatic life style in the triassic diapsid
reptile tanystropheus. - Rivista Italiana di Paleontologia e
Stratigrafia (Research in Paleontology and Stratigraphy). 124 (1): N.1
- Silvio Renesto & Franco Saller - 2018.
- A taxonomic revision of the genus Tanystropheus
(Archosauromorpha,
Tanystropheidae). - Palaeontologia Electronica. 22.3.80. - Stephan N.F.
Spiekmann & Torsten M. Scheyer - 2019.
- Aquatic Habits and Niche Partitioning in the Extraordinarily
Long-Necked Triassic Reptile Tanystropheus. -
Current Biology. 0 (19):
3889–3895.e2. - Stephan N. F. Spiekman, James M. Neenan, Nicholas C.
Fraser, Vincent Fernandez, Olivier Rieppel, Stefania Nosotti &
Torsten M. Scheyer - 2020.