Reader Comments

Post a new comment on this article

Little nitpick.

Posted by MBetancourt on 16 Nov 2014 at 00:16 GMT

I noticed a little factual error in your publication, you wrote:

An adult specimen of L. ferox with a cranial length of ~126 cm has been estimated to have a total body length of 6.39 m [92], although the largest known L. ferox skull has a length of 154 cm (NHMUK PV R3536).

The (reconstructed) cranial length of the specimen that Noe, Liston and Evans (2003) estimate at 6.39m in total length is 123cm not ~126cm, the ~126cm skull they mention is in fact NHMUK PV R3536, the discrepancy of the skull length they mention and the one mentioned by you is explained by both being measurements of different things, If you check Andrews (1913), page 22, you'll find this:

Skull : length from quadrate to tip of snout . . . . . . . . . 154.0
„ „ occipital condyle to tip of snout . . . 126.5


The second measurement, the one mentioned by Noe, Liston and Evans (2003), is the one comparable to the one you were using in your publication for Plesiosuchus and Dakosaurus, so comparing apples to apples the largest L. ferox skull is ~126cm long not 154cm.

References:
Andrews CW (1913) A descriptive catalogue of the marine reptiles of the Oxford Clay – based on the Leeds
collection in the British Museum (Natural History), London, part II. London: British Museum (Natural History), 206 pp.
Noe LF, Liston J, Evans M (2003) The first relatively complete exoccipitalopisthotic from the braincase of the Callovian pliosaur, Liopleurodon. Geol Mag 140: 479–486.

No competing interests declared.