Alligatorellus

Alligatorellus Temporal range: Late Jurassic
Alligatorellus beaumonti in the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences.
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Reptilia
Superorder:	Crocodylomorpha
Family:	†Atoposauridae
Genus:	†Alligatorellus Gervais, 1871
Type species
†Alligatorellus beaumonti Gervais, 1871

Fossil specimen

Alligatorellus is a genus of atoposaurid crocodyliform found in France that was related to Atoposaurus.^[1]

A skeleton of Alligatorellus has also been found in the Solnhofen Limestone of Kelheim, Germany. The limestone was deposited in a marine environment and the individual may have washed into a lagoon where it was fossilized. Remains of four crinoids that lived in the lagoon are found in the same block as the skeleton. The skeleton includes osteoderms and limb bones, which are three-dimensionally preserved. The German skeleton shows more details of atoposaurid anatomy than most fossils, as other atoposaurid remains are compressed flat.^[2]

References

1. Buscalioni, Angela D; Jose Luis Sanz. "Phylogenetic Relationships of the Atoposauridae (Archosauria, Crocodylomorpha)" (PDF). Historical Biology. Harwood Academic Publishers Inc. I (1988): 233–250. doi:10.1080/08912968809386477. Retrieved 2008-09-05.
2. Schwarz-Wings, D.; Klein, N.; Neumann, C.; Resch, U. (2011). "A new partial skeleton of Alligatorellus (Crocodyliformes) associated with echinoids from the Late Jurassic (Tithonian) lithographic limestone of Kelheim, S-Germany". Fossil Record. 14 (2): 195–205. doi:10.1002/mmng.201100007.