Talk:Plotosaurus

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Plotosaurus swimming style: new study

https://www.livescience.com/mosasaur-breaststroke-swimming.html

Poorly edited article, and results not yet published, but interesting. Paper presented at the recent GSA meeting in PHX. --Pete Tillman (talk) 16:21, 25 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Using our image, no less... FunkMonk (talk) 18:26, 25 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Skeletal Identification

Hi Macrophyseter, I believe the skeleton image you added depicts Plesiotylosaurus? A Google image search seems to indicate this. FunkMonk (talk) 08:38, 6 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Looking again, image searches for Plotosaurus also show the same mount. I wonder what's going on? FunkMonk (talk) 09:03, 6 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I wish it was a skeleton of Plesiotylosaurus, we need better skeletal representation of a mosasaur like that. However, the skeleton in question is of a Plotosaurus and not Plesiotylosaurus. I have personally visited the museum many times and I can confirm that the identification for the skeleton is of a Plotosaurus. There is a Plesiotylosaurus fossil displayed in a wall adjacent to the skeleton, and I can see how some people might mistakenly associate the mounted skeleton with the Plesiotylosaurus fossil, especially since the label for the skeleton is located at a different side. I would personally caution against taking word from a nonscientific source regarding the identification of any supposed fossil specimens without up-to-date verification, I have seen countless image posts of museum fossils in Google searches where the image poster misidentifies the taxon.

I have identified the specimen catalog of the skeleton from the LACM database [1], plus more recognizable photos of the skeleton with correct identification by the University of Maryland [2]. We'll have to rename the file for the original photo.Macrophyseter | talk 09:24, 6 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, nice, that makes sense with the labelling (I think I uploaded the same photo on Commons[3] years ago without there being any identification on Flickr, so had to do it by Google research, as is often the case with unlabelled images). Great job on Mosasaurus by the way, I got a peak at your sandbox when I looked at where one of the images were used. Any idea when it goes live? FunkMonk (talk) 09:30, 6 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, the photo I put on the taxobox is simply a photoshop of your original upload, which I removed the background and color-treated to make the skull visible, I probably should note that in the file description. As for the Mosasaurus draft, I'm actually close to physically done with it before I have it go live on the Wikipedia article, I need to complete at least two more subsections and redo the lead. I can probably churn it out by next week if I have time to commit to writing a bit on the weekends, hopefully earlier if I have time to finish on the weekdays. The Mosasaurus draft is really time-intensive because I have to do intensive research just to write out a few sentences of something.Macrophyseter | talk 17:00, 6 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I've also thought of tackling a mosasaur article, but nothing as daunting as Mosasaurus itself, so good luck with that! Elasmosaurus was hard enough when it comes to complicated historical literature, but at least it only has one definite specimen and species... FunkMonk (talk) 13:57, 7 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Size estimate

Hi Macrophyseter. Gregory S. Paul in 2022 estimated the size of Plotosaurus at 13 m (43 ft) in length and 5.9 t (6.5 short tons) in body mass. Is there an exceptionally large Plotosaurus skull or skeleton that could reach this size? I'm asking this, since this is even heavier than his M. hoffmannii estimate (and since you're pretty much the mosasaur expert in Wikipedia). Junsik1223 (talk) 01:37, 10 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I'm just a mosasaur enthusiast :) The only other source that has mentioned 13m was a website called Prehistoric Wildlife, but they don't explain which fossil this was based on; the max skull size they provided is too small. The largest skull that I know of is 79.1 cm along the lower jaw (Camp, 1942), but this isn't big enough to realistically yield a 13m plotosaur. It's possible that the estimate was based on extrapolating some exceptionally large vertebra(e) (since the skeletal reconstruction of Plotosaurus is quite rigorous) that I either overlooked or is unpublished. Also, I would caution against taking Paul's field guide as authoritatively as scholarly papers because it makes a lot of bold disputations against published research without discussing them and providing justification (although it's because the book is a field guide), and I've heard from some paleoartists that some of his reconstructions are really inaccurate (I don't have full access to the book, but I've heard that Paul depicted Plotosaurus as an anguilliform swimmer, which is the opposite of the rigorously supported carangiform mode of swimming), although there's also pretty good ones too. The reason why I ran with his 13m estimate for Mosasaurus hoffmannii was because a size around that has already been seen as more accurate by the paleontological community for years but nobody published anything officially proposing it besides him. Also keep in mind that Paul is going over hundreds of species within a relatively short span. While his opinions deserve consideration, I think they should be viewed with more scrutiny. Macrophyseter | talk 05:50, 10 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah Paul's pterosaur book was the worst in this regard, although the sea reptiles one is so much better. The 13 m estimate is not the first here, but this was from a 2016 article that found a referred specimen of Plotosaurus in Central Chile. [4] The article claims that an adult Plotosaurus would be 10~13 m but a justification was not exactly stated; it's kinda strange considering that even the article which synonimised P. tuckeri to P. bennisoni suggested a maximum length of 8 m. Junsik1223 (talk) 09:12, 10 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't use that estimate outside of stating that the paper made that estimate without referring to any specific fossils. Slate Weasel is also right; its possible that the official publication of the book may have better input. Macrophyseter | talk 19:56, 10 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I'd be especially wary of citing Paul's marine reptile book or making any statements about its quality until it's actually published (which won't be until October). --Slate Weasel [Talk - Contribs] 12:41, 10 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]