Pterodactyloidea Pterodactyloidea Pterodactyloidea (derived from the Greek words "πτερόν" ("pterón", for usual "ptéryx") "wing", and "δάκτυλος" ("dáctylos") "finger" meaning "winged finger", "wing-finger" or "finger-wing") is one of the two traditional suborders of pterosaurs ("wing lizards"), and contains the most derived members of this group of flying reptiles. They appeared during the middle Jurassic Period, and differ from the basal (though paraphyletic) rhamphorhynchoids by their short tails and long wing metacarpals (hand bones). The most advanced forms also lack teeth, and by the late Cretaceous, all known pterodactyloids were toothless. Many species had well developed crests on the skull, a form of
Cretaceous in the very late Cretaceous and early Paleocene. The cooling trend of last epoch of the Jurassic continued into the first age of the Cretaceous. There is evidence that snowfalls were common in the higher latitudes and the tropics became wetter than during the Triassic and Jurassic. Glaciation was however restricted to high-latitude mountains, though seasonal snow may have existed farther from the poles. Rafting by ice of stones into marine environments occurred during much of the Cretaceous but evidence of deposition directly from glaciers is limited to the Early Cretaceous of the Eromanga Basin in southern Australia. After the