Talk:Mamenchisaurus

Untitled
Omeisaurus' tail club

pronunciation
I tried fixing the IPA, but either the stress was wrong, or the vowels were. It wasn't a possible English pronuntiation. Please confirm that I didn't mess it up further. kwami 07:57, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
 * At The Dinosauria Translation and Pronunciation Guide, there are two pronunciations listed. I've always used the second, which means it's probably wrong because it's closest to phonetic sounding, and it seems like dinosaur names derived from Chinese do not sound at all like what they "look" like. However, I've never heard anyone say it with a "u" sound for the second vowel, as is presented there. J. Spencer 14:24, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Since look-like pronunciations are easier, shall we stick to the less intuitive one? men in Mandarin sounds something like fun, as in Tian'anmen Square, which has the same character. kwami 19:19, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Wrong image?
Isn't the rising sauropod in the Field Museum Barosaurus?--MWAK (talk) 12:48, 22 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Doesn't look like it, you may be confusing it with the rearing Barosaurus in the AMNH. Dinoguy2 (talk) 13:08, 22 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I did :oS.--MWAK (talk) 05:53, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

The taxobox image should be changed, it clearly shows a theropod in the background with the outdated stance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.108.138.162 (talk) 13:41, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Omeisaurus' tail club
The article says Mamenchisaurus had a tail club "like Shunosaurus and Omeisaurus", but the Omeisaurus article says that the "Omeisaurus" tail club is likely to be that of a large Shunosaurus. Sauropods aren't my strong suit; which is correct? Albertonykus (talk) 06:12, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
 * The recent M. tail club paper doesn't mention any debate over Omeisaurus's tail club. The line about Omeisaurus tail club is unscourced. There is this on the DML, but I don't know of any published sources saying that. Steveoc 86 (talk) 12:05, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

External links modified
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Contradictory information
"it may include one of the largest complete dinosaur specimens known" and "M. sinocanadorum was described, which consisted of skull material and the first four cervical vertebrae. [...] Additional remains attributed to this species, but not yet formally described, belong to one of the largest dinosaurs known—the restored skeleton measuring 35 metres"

"Attributed to this species" and "restored skeleton" confirm there is no complete M. sinocanadorum skeleton.Gamma 124 (talk) 23:48, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Good catch, now corrected.  Luso titan  (Talk | Contributions) 04:30, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

Article Expansion
I've expanded this article; it's far from perfect but hopefully an improvement. I'm not happy with the 'Other Mamenchisaurus species and material' section. Several dubious species have been named but are rarely mentioned or discussed, which makes writing about them tricky. I haven't been able to find a copy of the initial naming of M. yannanensis (Fang et al., 2004), M. changshouensis & M. gongjianensis (Zhang and Chen, 1996), M. yaochinensis (He et al., 1996 vide Dong, 1999). The only evidence of M. chuanjieensis and M. jiangshanensis I've found is in 'Dinosaur Facts and Figures' (Larramendi & Molina-Pérez 2020). It lists them both as invalid, and I don't know who named them or when. M. guangyuanensis is briefly mentioned in Zhang et al. 1998 (M. jingyanensis description) as "unpublished" and no other details are given. However, Wang et al. 2019 credits 'Zhang 1981' for the species name and says it's from the Upper Shaximiao, but calls it 'fragmentary and undiagnostic' in the text; citing Yang 2014 and Ye 2008. I haven't been able to locate a copy of these two papers, one of which is a PhD thesis. Steveoc 86 (talk) 20:55, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Nice, thanks, good work! The "Dinosaur Facts and Figures" book is considered a children's book that does not qualify as a high-quality reliable source according to the experts at FAC (we just had that discussion again). So I don't think we need to take that into account, but in any case, could the M. chuanjieensis species be the same as Analong? Ye 2008 seems to be some sort of conference abstract. "M. guangyuanensis" should be a Nomen nudum. I can send you Fang et al. 2004, but it is completely in Chinese. I also have Zhang and Chen, 1996 (in English!). Write me an Wiki mail and I send you both if you like. As for "M. yaochinensis", does that even exist? Where does it come from? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 21:39, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks, those two papers would be great! Regarding "M. yaochinensis". It's mentioned on the DML here as a suspected Nomen nudem and is credited to 'He et al., 1996 vide Dong, 1999'. The DML poster writes, 'The paper is in the I Encontro Internacional Sobre Paleobiologia dos Dinossaurios Programa de Musealizacao para Pistas de Dinossaurios em Portugal, and the taxon is on p. 82.' . Mortimer mentions it here, and listed here That's all the info I have.
 * Regarding M. chuanjieensis, It wouldn't surprise me if someone, somewhere, was going to lump it into Mamenchisaurus before creating Analong? but ultimately I don't know. Should we just remove these species? Steveoc 86 (talk) 22:07, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Sure, check your email! I would personally judge that the "Facts and Figures" book can't be used as a source, especially in this context, and would indeed just remove those two names that exclusively depend on it. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 22:25, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I have some information on this: "M. chuanjieensis" appears to have originated in Fang et al. 2000, the paper that also names Chuanjiesaurus anaensis. The paper mentions Mamenchisaurus fossils from the Upper Jurassic of the Chuanjie Basin (Chuanjiesaurus is from the Middle Jurassic), but does not mention a particular species. They later call the Upper Jurassic fauna of the Chuanjie Basin the "Mamenchisaurus chuanjieensis Fauna", but in context, this seems to be an error for what might be better termed the "Chuanjie Mamenchisaurus Fauna". As such, in the absence of further information, we can probably ignore "Mamenchisaurus chuanjieensis" as simply an error. "M. guangyuanensis" is a nomen nudum that is nonetheless mentioned in several Chinese papers; it was originally described as "Omeisaurus guangyuanensis" in a 1981 thesis. There probably exists enough published information on it to mention it in the article. I have been unable to find any further information on "M. yaochinensis", "M. gongjianensis", or "M. jiangshanensis", but I'm still looking. Ornithopsis (talk) 21:51, 15 November 2021 (UTC)
 * It occurs to me that "M. chuanjieensis" appears to be the same thing as Mamenchisaurus yunnanensis: Fang et al. 2000 called the fauna of the Upper Jurassic of the Chuanjie Basin the "Mamenchisaurus chuanjieensis fauna"; Fang et al. 2004 called the fauna of the Upper Jurassic of the Chuanjie Basin the "Mamenchisaurus yunnanensis fauna". Likely it's just an error or provisional name that slipped through editing. Ornithopsis (talk) 23:58, 16 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for this! Sorry, I somehow missed your comments. I've removed M. yaochinensis for the time being, since we only have a single DML post to back it up.
 * So, just to get my head round this, the current list of questionable species so far is,
 *  M. yunnanensis  - Named by Fang et al. (2004) - Possibly the same as  M. chuanjieensis  ? (see above).
 *  M. chuanjieensis  - Named by Fang et al. (2000) - Possibly the same as  M. yunnanensis  ? (see above).
 *  M. jiangshanensis  - Mentioned in Dinosaur Facts and Figures as invalid (Larramendi & Molina-Pérez 2020) Not sure of original naming?
 *  M. yaochinensis  - Possibly named by 'He et al., 1996 vide Dong, 1999' according to a DML Post?
 *  M. guangyuanensis  - originally described as "Omeisaurus guangyuanensis" in a 1981 thesis (Zhang 1981?). When does it first get mentioned as a Mamenchisaurus species?
 * O. changshouensis - Referred to Mamenchisaurus by Zhang and Chen (1996), but seemingly misspelt as O. changshuoensis in the paper.
 *  O. gongjianensis  - Referred to Mamenchisaurus by Zhang and Chen (1996). Where has O. gongjianensis been named? Some websites credit 'Zhang & Wei, 1995'?
 * Steveoc 86 (talk) 15:27, 14 March 2023 (UTC)
 * M. yunnanensis Fang et al. 2004  - There's no doubt that this is a formally named species of Mamenchisaurus, although it seems to be considered a nomen dubium.
 * "M. chuanjieensis" - As I have only seen Fang et al. 2000 in translation, I am not sure if the name actually occurs in the original text. It may well be that the translator was mistaken. In any case, it seems very likely that "M. chuanjieensis" refers to the material that was named M. yunnanensis four years later.
 * "M. jiangshanensis" - I asked Larramendi about this, and he suggested they might have seen it in a work by Don Glut, but wasn't sure.
 * "M. yaochinensis" - Your guess is as good as mine.
 * M. changshouensis (Young 1958)  - Named by Young (1958) as a species of Omeisaurus; Zhang and Chen (1996) refer this species to Mamenchisaurus, and He et al. (1998) and Tan et al. (2019) have also considered it to show similarities to Mamenchisaurus. Generally seems to be viewed as a nomen dubium, though.
 * "M. guangyuanensis" - "O. guangyuanensis" does indeed come from Zhang's 1981 thesis, though I have not seen a copy. Li and Cai (1997; "Classification and evolution of Mamenchisaurus") called it "M. guangyuanensis" without comment, which seems to be the first use of that combination. Apparently based on a fair amount of material.
 * "M. gongjianensis" - Zhang and Chen (1996) seemingly suggest "O. gongjianensis" was named by C. C. Young. My best guess is that this an extremely garbled reference to Young (1942), in which he identified some teeth from Kuangyuan as cf. Omeisaurus junghsiensis, although I don't know how they would have gotten the name "gongjianensis". I don't know what Zhang and Wei (1995) is.
 * Of these seven names, M. yunnanensis and O/M. changshouensis have both been formally named (though they seem to be considered dubious), so they're both worth mentioning in some capacity. "O/M. guangyanensis" is definitely a real thing, albeit not formally named, and may also be worth mentioning. "M. chuanjieensis" appears to simply be an error and should be ignored. The other three names are mysterious and may or may not have some substance, and should probably also be disregarded in the absence of a more definite source. Ornithopsis (talk) 01:15, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Cladogram
An IP user has noticed an issue with the first cladogram. When I expanded the article, I copied it over from the old version, but that cladogram doesn't appear in Wilson 2002. Does anyone know which paper it's from? or if there is a better one to use? Steveoc 86 (talk) 11:21, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I've temporarily swapped the current cladogram for a simpler one by Allain and Aquesbi 2008. Steveoc 86 (talk) 12:06, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
 * The same cladogram was on the Shunosaurus page (which I deleted) and on the Omeisaurus page (I just removed the Tazoudasaurus, which would make the cladogram anachronistic) 49.144.207.182 (talk) 00:57, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I noticed it's on a few pages. I found a potential cladogram from Otero et al. 2015. It mas many of the taxa from the old cladogram and it's more recent than the one by Allain and Aquesbi 2008. However, I've never drawn cladograms in Wiki code, and my attempts have been unsuccessful. Steveoc 86 (talk) 15:48, 16 March 2021 (UTC)