Talk:Pliosauroidea

Opening heading
Are Pliosaurs Arctic animals? Because it seems every Pliosaur I've seen seems to hang around cold places, England, Norway, Alaska, the Sundance Sea that went into Wyoming from''' Alaska.
 * As an Englishman, I'm extremely surprised I'm from a cold, Arctic locale.
 * Could be, but how many warm water Mesozoic fossil sites (deep enough for pliosaurs) are known? (i.e., there might be a sampling bias) J. Spencer 15:07, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
 * You do must realize that when pliosaurs were alive, the regions they were found in were tropical or subtropical, as the shapes of microfossil tests of foraminifera and radiolaria found in the same regions are typical of the tests of modern day foraminifera and radiolaria that live in tropical and subtropical waters.--Mr Fink 17:04, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I have some pics of a pliosaur skeleton from the NHM London which I'm happy to post.Skipperjeru 17:21, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Yep, go ahead! ArthurWeasley 19:18, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Should this article be in British or American English? At present it is in a mixture of both: we have "meters" in paragraph 2 and "paleontologist/s" (3 times) under "Discoveries", but "metres" and "3-metre" under "Discoveries". Also, shouldn't "m" (twice) under "Discoveries" be expanded to "meters" or "metres" (unless all units of length are contracted), and shouldn't these metric lengths have Imperial equivalents? If "m" is expanded to "meters" or "metres", shouldn't "ft" be expanded to "feet" (throughout) for consistency? A final suggestion: the meaning of the Greek root of "plio-" is given as "more/a higher degree". So, wouldn't something like "a higher degree of lizards" be a better definition of the word "pliosaurs" than "more lizards"?Old Father Time (talk) 19:59, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * As the group was named and first studied in the UK, I think using British English would be best to follow usage in other paleo articles. The name should be translated as "more saurian", though. From the DOL Omnipedia:
 * "named to indicate a reptile that was supposedly even more like a crocodile in its anatomical organization than Plesiosaurus was according to the chain-of-being-type classification still widely accepted in England in the 1840s. In Owen's words (1842), "The Enaliosaurs are immediately connected with the Crocodilian reptiles by an extinct genus, represented by species of gigantic size...The Reptile in question is essentially a modified Plesiosaurus, but its modifications appear to entitle it to be regarded as a distinct genus, which, as it is more closely allied to the true Sauria, I have proposed to call Pliosaurus." Owen (1841) cited the "more crocodilian proportion of the teeth" in particular."
 * So, maybe Pliosaurus (meaning "more saurian [than Plesiosaurus]") would be appropriate. Dinoguy2 (talk) 22:17, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Under "Name", it is stated that Richard Owen coined the name in 1842. However, the "Classification" gives a date of 1841 for the publication of the description of Pliosaurus. Is this a contradiction, or is there some distinction between the :Looks like a contradiction. Paleobio database says 1841 Dinoguy2 (talk) 15:00, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Which is it?
Does pliosaur refer to the suborder Pliosauroidea or just to the family Pliosauridae (both pages redirected), or perhaps only to the genus Pliosaurus. So which?

Pliosaur is a generalized term that may apply to any of, but doesn't substitute for terms like Pliosauroidea or Pliosauridae that have specific meaning. J.H.McDonnell (talk) 13:22, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: page moved. The dab page is up to you to decide if really needed. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:06, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Pliosaur → Pliosauroidea – There is no such thing as "Pliosauria" or "Pliosaur". These clade names have never appeared/used in any formal/peer reviewed paper, and a definition for "Pliosauria" have never suggested. The correct terminology in this case is Pliosauroidea: "all taxa more closely related to Pliosaurus brachydeirus than to Plesiosaurus dolichodeirus" (from Ketchum & Benson, 2010), or "pliosauroid" to describe a particular member of the group. Rnnsh (talk) 07:49, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I'd say this page should be moved to Pliosauroidea and Pliosaur redirect to Pliosaurus. Cf. Pterodactyl, which directs to Pterodactylus not Pterodactyloidea. A "pliosaur" properly refers to a member of the genus Pliosaurus. Although, for contrast, see "Dinosaur", which is currently used for the clade Dinosauria not the genus Dinosaurus.MMartyniuk (talk) 12:49, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I totally agree with you, but in this case I would suggest to make it a "disambiguation" page and there explane that Pliosauroidea isn't the same thing as ""Pliosaur(ia)"". I tried to "move" it first but for some reason it didn't work... Rnnsh (talk) 13:35, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure a DAB page is necessary because, as you noted, there's no such thing as Pliosauria. We don't have Pterodactyl go to a DAB page explaining there's no such thing as Pterodactylia... MMartyniuk (talk) 16:00, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * You're probably right about that... Then the best option is to redirect it to Pliosaurus. Rnnsh (talk) 16:41, 14 October 2011 (UTC)


 * sort of oppose—I'm no expert, but pliosaur appears to mean anything in Pliosauroidea, the way that dinosaur means anything in Dinosauria. I don't know what the nominator is trying to get at with 'There is no such thing as ... "Pliosaur".' Obviously there is such a thing, peer-reviewed papers use the term quite often. I'm pretty sure pliosaur should not redirect to Pliosaurus. Consider the title of this article: The skull of the giant predatory pliosaur Rhomaleosaurus cramptoni: implications for plesiosaur phylogenetics. And this, basically claiming that a pliosaur is any short necked plesiosaur. There are many more RS that use the word in this way. I think the article title is fine how it is, since pliosaur seems to be the common name for this group the way that dinosaur is for Dinosauria, although I can see a case for the proposed retitling on the grounds of it being more precise. Perhaps there's a very strong case to be made for it, I don't know enough to say. ErikHaugen (talk &#124; contribs) 17:12, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm also somewhat opposing a move. "Pliosaur" is used in many papers, and not just for Pliosaurus. That said, Pliosaur doesn't equal Pliosauroidea or Pliosauria. I'd support making a disambiguation page explaining the different possible meanings, but not redirectig "Pliosaur" to Pliosaurus. And why does "Pliosaur" imply there is such thing as "Pliosauria"? Smokeybjb (talk) 20:19, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I think that the name "Pliosauroidea" (or Pliosauroid) is more correct in any case than "Pliosaur". I understand what you're saying and this is why I originally suggested a disambiguation page as the best option. But Pliosauroidea has only one meaning - and it's the subject of this article (it can't be a disambiguation page), while "Pliosaur" has many, not official, meanings like the family, or the genus.. I suggest to move this page to Pliosauroidea and create a disambiguation page to explain other possible meanings. (I mentioned "Pliosauria" to avoid arguments like the "dinosauria ---> dinosaur than why not pliosauria ---> pliosaur" thing [because pliosauria≠pliosaur while dinosaur and dinosauria, for example, are nearly the same thing], but it didn't work...) Rnnsh (talk) 16:50, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
 * support disambiguation So the best thing to is to rename this article Pliosauroidea and create a disambiguation page showing that a "pliosaur" could either mean a member of Pliosauroidea or a member of Pliosauridae. I don't think we should mention Pliosauria at all because although there is the potential for confusion, there's no real confusion in the literature. Nor should we link Pliosaurus in the disambiguation page, because I've never heard anyone restrict all pliosaurs to members of the genus Pliosaurus. Smokeybjb (talk) 19:03, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
 * support disambiguation I support this option too. Note about Pliosaurus: I know that in many languages people tend to ignore the us ending of many generic names, and I even heard once on TV the name "Pliosaur andrewsi" (in english with subtitles in different language but with the same mistake). I think we should inform people about that misuse, but on the other hand it might be something too general to include on that particular disambiguation page... Another example: "Плиозавр (лат. Pliosaurus) - типовой род этой группы." (from the russian wikipedia page of this article [завр=saur], meaning: Pliosaur (Latin Pliosaurus) - type genus of this group [the group is "pliosaurs"]) Rnnsh (talk) 20:07, 18 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Support without disambiguation. If Pliosauroidea wasn't what they were after when they searched for Pliosaur, they should have searched for the taxon name. And most people who know about the difference would be able to navigate to it using the taxobox. Bob the WikipediaN (talk • contribs) 17:29, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Pliosaur 2009
Was the pliosaur from Dorest in 2009 a Liopleurodon or a Pliosaurus? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 112.135.105.208 (talk) 07:30, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Pliosaurus kevani
The last section of the article seems to have a contradiction. First it says that the species named P. kevani had a body length of 16 meters, but then the last sentence says that in "real life" P. kevani was only around 10 meters long. If this 16 meters individual was the type specimen, by definition doesn't that mean P. kevani is 16 meters? I'm not sure I understand. 68.156.95.34 (talk) 08:59, 16 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Hi there! I corrected this mistake. It's likely P.kevani reached around 8 metres in length, as opposed to the 16 metres that was originally mentioned. P.kevani is known from only a relatively complete skull, and no post cranial material is known from the type. The 16 metre estimate probably spawned from news articles publicising the finding, though a 1:8 (skull : body) ratio is not documented for any of the Pliosaurus genus, 1:4 is an average. In fact, P.kevani may be even smaller, as P.funkei (a sister taxon, Benson et al. 2013) has an even smaller ratio of 1:3.6. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DaCaTaraptor (talk • contribs) 20:55, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

Article needs some dating .....
For instance, we should have some citations for when they first definitely appeared (split off from plesiosaurs) and when the last of the species went extinct - I think some paleontologists think that some smaller-sized species may have lasted to the KT/K-Pg Event? 104.169.26.177 (talk) 05:04, 17 January 2017 (UTC)