Anurognathidae

Anurognathidae is a family of small, short-tailed pterosaurs that lived in Europe, Asia, and possibly North America during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. Eight genera are definitively known: Anurognathus, from the Late Jurassic of Germany; Jeholopterus, Luopterus, Cascocauda and Sinomacrops, from the Middle to Late Jurassic of China; Batrachognathus, from the Late Jurassic of Kazakhstan; and Dendrorhynchoides and Vesperopterylus, from the Early Cretaceous of China. Bennett (2007) suggested that the holotype of Mesadactylus, BYU 2024, a synsacrum, belonged to an anurognathid, though this affinity has been questioned by other authors. Mesadactylus is from the Late Jurassic Morrison Formation of the United States. Indeterminate anurognathid remains have also been reported from the Middle Jurassic Bakhar Svita of Mongolia and the Early Cretaceous of North Korea. Anurognathids had wingspans of up to 900 mm.

==Classification== thumb|upright|left|Anurognathid skeletons to scale A family Anurognathidae was named in 1928 by Franz Nopcsa von Felső-Szilvás (as the subfamily Anurognathinae) with Anurognathus as the type genus. The family name Anurognathidae was first used by Oskar Kuhn in 1967.