Lonchodectes was a genus of lonchodectidpterosaur from several formations dating to the Turonian of England, mostly in the area around Kent. The species belonging to it had been assigned to Ornithocheirus until David Unwin's work of the 1990s and 2000s. Several potential species are known; most are based on scrappy remains, and have gone through several other generic assignments. The genus is part of the complex taxonomy issues surrounding Early Cretaceous pterosaurs from Brazil and England, such as Amblydectes, Anhanguera, Coloborhynchus, and Ornithocheirus.
History and species
Numerous species have been referred to this genus over time, and only those more widely connected with the genus are included here. The type species, L. compressirostris, is based on NHMUK 39410, a partial upper jaw from the Turonian-age Upper CretaceousUpper Chalk near Kent. Richard Owen named in 1851 as a species of Pterodactylus; it was transferred to Ornithocheirus in 1870 by Harry Govier Seeley, before becoming the type species of Lonchodectes in Reginald Walter Hooley's 1914 review of Ornithocheirus. Confusingly, this species was also long regarded, incorrectly, as the type species of Ornithocheirus. A variety of postcranial remains resembling those of Azhdarchoids from the Cambridge Greensand have been referred to Lonchodectes; however, much of this material has since been referred to Ornithostoma.
Formerly assigned species
Hooley added two other species at this time, both of which had also been originally referred to Pterodactylus, then to Ornithocheirus: L. giganteus, a Cenomanian-age jaw fragment from the Chalk of Kent; and L. daviesii, another jaw fragment, from the Albian-age Gault Clay. "Pterodactylus" sagittirostris, based on NHMUK R.1823, a lower jaw fragment from the ?Valanginian-Hauterivian-age Lower CretaceousHastings Beds of East Sussex, "Ornithocheirus" platystomus, "Ornithocheirus" machaerorhynchus, and "O." microdon were assigned to Lonchodectes in a 2001 review by David Unwin of Cambridge Greensand pterosaurs. joining L. compressirostris, L. giganteus, L. platystomus, and L. sagittirostris in his listing of valid species. However, L. giganteus, L. machaerorhynchus, and L. microdon have since been assigned to a new genus, Lonchodraco, while L. sagittirostris has been renamed Serradraco. L. platystomus may be a species of Amblydectes
Classification
In Peter Wellnhofer's 1991 The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Pterosaurs, written before Unwin's work, the species were included within Ornithocheirus, and are in fact the main fossils illustrated to represent the genus. In 2003, Unwin placed them in their own family, Lonchodectidae, which he grouped within the group Ctenochasmatoidea, while in 2006, he placed the family Lonchodectidae within the Azhdarchoidea, the group that includes the tapejarids and azhdarchids. The cladogram below is a topology recovered by Longrich and colleagues in 2018. In their analysis, they placed Lonchodectes within the family Lonchodectidae as the sister taxon of Lonchodraco. Contrary to previous analysis, Longrich and colleagues placed Lonchodectidae within the more inclusive group Lanceodontia.
Paleobiology
Lonchodectes had long jaws with many short teeth, and the jaws were compressed vertically, like "a pair of sugar tongs with teeth". Related species had crests on their lower jaws, so the same probably also applied to L. compressirostris.
