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Saurophaganax, a sister genus of Allosaurus[edit]

Chure (2000) accepts Saurophaganax as a valid genus related to Allosaurus. Therefore remove Saurophaganax from synonymy with Allosaurus once his thesis is published.

Chure D. J., 2000. A new species of Allosaurus from the Morrison Formation of Dinosaur National Monument (Utah-Colorado) and a revision of the theropod family Allosauridae. Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, 1-964.

Size[edit]

On the allosaurus note, i though allosaurus was larger. Correct me if i am wrong but i thought it was 11m.Spinodontosaurus (talk) 18:27, 11 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, some specimens indicate a length of thirteen metres. The original estimates for Saurophaganax surpassed this though, which has led to some confusion.--MWAK (talk) 08:39, 6 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There are at least 3 specimens in the the OMNH material, the largest one is represented by a 1.135m femur and there's material of a comparable animal, the smaller one has a 1.04m femur, 3% larger than the femur of AMNH680 (1.008m) Really, I can't see where the 13m estimates came from, the 1.135m femur represents an animal 12.6% larger than the 9.7m AMNH680 A. fragilis, that is a 10.9m animal, and is the same lenght estimate by Mickey Mortimer. Maybe the larger estimates came out using Big Al as guide and believing it was 9m j/k. Mike.BRZ (talk) 20:00, 18 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Saurophagus redirect[edit]

The present Saurophagus simply redirects to Saurophaganax, while it should redirect to one of the bird genera the real Saurophagus species have since been referred to or be a disambiguation page.

After a bit of digging, I think Saurophagus was originally coined by Swainson 1832 as Saurophagus sulphuratus, now Pitangus sulphuratus, so I changed the redirect to Pitangus. MMartyniuk (talk) 00:27, 7 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent! I think the 1832 date given by many sources is a mistake caused by the assumption that the mention in Swainson's 1832 On several groups and forms in ornithology, not hitherto defined was the first. But the name appears already in his volume of Fauna boreali-Americana.--MWAK (talk) 05:35, 7 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Chure's opinion of "Saurophagus maximus"[edit]

I don't have these papers and I'm a little confused on this point. Apparently Chure considered Saurophagus maximus Stovall 1941 both a nomen dubium and a numen nudum, that is, the description was not sufficient to actually coin the name (Mortimer doesn't seem to agree at Theropod Database). Therefore, in this article it says Saurophaganax maximus is not a renaming, but rather a new animal with the same name Chure coined based on a different holotype, which he then referred Stovall's holotype to. Questions: if the original holotype was a nomen dubium, how can it be referred to Chure's species? Is it only dubious at the genus level? In this case, we'd have two species in this genus: S. maximus (Stovall 1941) and S. maximus Chure 1995 (type species). Does the ICZN even allow homonyms within a genus? If he does regard his S. maximus as conspecific with Stovall's "S. maximus", but regards the latter as a nomen nudum, was he merely trying to "re-create" the species based on a better holotype? I suppose it would either be that or the most blatant attempt at stealing credit I've ever seen... "I hereby decree the type specimen of Tyrannosaurus rex (Osborn 1905) is a nomen nudum, because Osborn didn't write gen. nov. in the systematic paleontology section. I therefore name a new species, based on Sue, named Tyrannosaurus rex (Chure 2005)!" ;) MMartyniuk (talk) 05:50, 7 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the thing is that Stovall's type was not a holotype but a syntype series. Lucas e.a. then designated a lectotype from this series. This makes it very hard to argue that Saurophagus was from 1987 a nomen nudum. Precisely because there is a lectotype, designating a new type for Saurophagus would have obliged Chure to petition the ICZN to assign an official neotype, which is a cumbersome process. Therefore it was very convenient that the name was preoccupied; he could use this to create an entirely new genus. Saurophagus maximus is not the type species of Saurophaganax which would have been the case if a renaming had taken place: it is materially a different species from Saurophaganax maximus, after all based on a different type. Of course it would have been better if Chure had used a different specific name; the present situation strongly suggests an identity...--MWAK (talk) 06:28, 7 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

But only the genus was preoccupied. "x" maximus Stovall 1941 should theoretically still be a "valid" (nomenclaturally) taxon. Is the lectotype one of the elements Chure referred to his Saurophaganax maximus? If not, then "Saurophagus" maximus is a distinct though dubious taxon and might even warrant a separate article here... it also still needs a new name, which then if it turns out DOES belong with the rest, will have to be synonymized.

Basically, we've got

"Saurophagus" maximus Stovall 1941
Saurophaganax maximus Chure 1995

OR we've got only

Saurophaganax maximus (Stovall 1941) Chure 1995

Even if the first was based on a different type, if it's referred to the newer taxon, one maximus takes priority over the other. If it wasn't referred, we're dealing with two distinct taxa at this point. I understand Chure didn't want to have to petition the ICZN for a neotype, but he left the situation far messier than he found it in order to take a short cut, IMO. MMartyniuk (talk) 07:02, 7 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I now see the problem: Mortimer lists the tibia as one of the paratypes! As I understand it, his list is a full summation of the entire "Saurophagus" material found by Stovall, not just of the referred elements. But I don't have Chure's dissertation either :>(.--MWAK (talk) 10:44, 7 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

And should it yet be proven that the tibia belongs to Saurophaganax, we don't need a neotype at all :o).--MWAK (talk) 06:35, 7 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sam Noble Museum[edit]

I take it from what I read here that the skeleton in the above museum (and elsewhere) is a reconstruction based on the few specific fragments + Allosaur material. If it is something different I would appreciate hearing. 212.159.59.41 (talk) 20:12, 5 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

In any case it is a cast, not a complete original skeleton. The fossil fragments are not all that limited, so a modicum of authenticity should be present.--MWAK (talk) 13:18, 23 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

conflicting size estimates[edit]

This article says that Saurophaganax is 13 meters long. But the dinosaur size article puts it at between 10.5 and 13 meters long, with a question marke in frunt of the 13 M estimate. I think that like the dinosaur size article this article should provide a range of estimates.Aliafroz1901 (talk) 10:26, 11 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Good catch, this article was probably not updated with GSP's estimate when the Size article was. I've added the additional size and weight estimate. MMartyniuk (talk) 14:45, 11 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

14 meters???[edit]

Chure, Daniel J. (1995). "A reassessment of the gigantic theropod Saurophagus maximus from the Morrison Formation (Upper Jurassic) of Oklahoma, USA". In A. Sun and Y. Wang (eds.). Sixth Symposium on Mesozoic Terrestrial Ecosystems and Biota, Short Papers. Beijing: China Ocean Press. pp. 103–106.

Why does Chure estimates it at 14m? Dinosaur size only puts it as 10.5-13m. Is that an oversized estimate or an old estimate? Dinosaur Fan (talk) 09:55, 29 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Likely an old estimate, much like how Giganotosaurus used to be way bigger than T.rex. Modern sources seem to place Saurophaganax at about 43 feet (13 m) long, comparably to Tyrannosaurus. Or maybe Chure simply rounded the 13.064 m size to an even 14 m. Dromaeosaurus is best dinosaur (talk) 13:14, 17 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding new image[edit]

Apart from it being from the study cited (and thus representing the quarry in questione) I'm pretty sure the theropod on the foreground biting on the foot of the carcass is meant to represent the big theropod which could be Saurophaganax, Torvosaurus or a big Allosaurus, because some of the big bite marks where found on theropod foot bones. Brutonyx20 (talk) 14:51, 7 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hm, yeah, I read a bit of the source where the image comes from, I guess we could leave it like that. JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 15:05, 7 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The reconstruction probably follows the big Allosaurus interpretation, but yeah I think it's appropriate, at least for visual context. Some information from that paper, image included, could also be added to the Allosaurus and Cercatosaurus pages in the future. Brutonyx20 (talk) 15:11, 7 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]