Dino card No. 0144 of 2,027

Aralazhdarcho

Say it: AIR-al-azh-DAR-ko

Name means: “Aral Sea azhdarchid”1

Ate: FishFlying reptilesLate CretaceousNot technically a dinosaur

Aralazhdarcho was a flying reptile that lived in what is now Kazakhstan. It had a long neck and no teeth, and it probably ate fish. It was a type of pterosaur called an azhdarchid.1 4

Fun fact: pterosaurs flew over the dinosaurs, but they were their cousins, not dinosaurs themselves.

Lived

86 to 72 million years ago4

Late Cretaceous

Fossils found in

Shakh-Shakh locality, Kyzylorda Region, Kazakhstan1 2

Food

Fish4

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

cool stuff

Fun facts

Aralazhdarcho is known from only a few bones, including a neck vertebra and part of a wing finger.1

It lived during the Santonian to early Campanian ages of the Late Cretaceous, about 85 to 72 million years ago.1 4

The name Aralazhdarcho combines the Aral Sea and the related pterosaur Azhdarcho.1

Some scientists think that another pterosaur called Samrukia might actually be the same as Aralazhdarcho.1

Aralazhdarcho was toothless, like other azhdarchid pterosaurs.1

Its fossils were found in the Bostobe Formation of Kazakhstan.1 4

AI-made picture of Aralazhdarcho — An AI-made picture of how Aralazhdarcho might have looked, made by a computer from what scientists know. It is a guess: the real animal may have looked different, and nobody knows its true colours.

you asked

Most asked questions about Aralazhdarcho

?How big was Aralazhdarcho?

Nobody knows for sure. Only a few bones have been found, so its exact size is unknown.1

?What did Aralazhdarcho eat?

It probably ate fish. It had no teeth and lived near a marine bay, so it likely caught fish with its beak.1 3

?Is Aralazhdarcho a dinosaur?

No, it is a pterosaur, a flying reptile that is not a dinosaur.1

Ask Rex about Aralazhdarcho

Rex only answers questions about this page. 3 questions a day.

Rex is an AI and can make mistakes. He runs on servers in the EU and questions are never saved. Never type your name or other personal things.

For dino experts

Scientific name: Aralazhdarcho
Named by: Averianov 20074
Group: Flying reptiles
Family / clade: Azhdarchidae4
Classification: Pterosauria > Pterodactyloidea > Azhdarchidae4
Age of the rocks: 86 to 72 million years (Santonian / Campanian)4
Rock formations: Bostobe4
Countries: Kazakhstan4
Fossil records: 1 in the Paleobiology Database4
Discovery: Aralazhdarcho was named in 2007 by Russian paleontologist Alexander Averianov. The first fossil, a neck vertebra, was found in the 1950s and later described in 2004.1
Still debated: Scientists are not sure exactly how big Aralazhdarcho was, because only a few bones have been found.1

Where the facts come from

Aralazhdarcho (en.wikipedia.org)
New records of Azhdarchids (Pterosauria, Azhdarchidae) from the late Cretaceous of Russia, Kazakhstan, and Central Asia (doc.rero.ch)
Review of taxonomy, geographic distribution, and paleoenvironments of Azhdarchidae (Pterosauria) (pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)
Aralazhdarcho in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.

Every fact on this page has a number that points to its source. If we got something wrong, sorry, we are dino fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.

Rex is hungry! Dino Wiki is a dad's project for his dino-loving son, free with no ads. Grown-ups can feed Rex a snack to help keep it online.Feed Rex