Guanlingsaurus is a genus of late Triassic ichthyosaur from China. It’s a member of the Shastasauridae household and for a time it was assigned to the Shastasaurus genus. It’s recognized from the Xiaowa Formation and lived alongside Guizhouichthyosaurus, which was additionally as soon as assigned to Shastasaurus. PNSO has made fashions of each genera. I beforehand reviewed the Guizhouichthyosaurus and likewise included it in my High Ten figures of 2025, now it’s time to have a look at PNSO’s Guanlingsaurus.
Guanlingsaurus is notable for having a small cranium, brief, triangular snout, toothless jaw, lengthy, shallow physique and tail, and brief flippers. These traits are intriguing and, In his guide, The Princeton Subject Information to Mesozoic Sea Reptiles, Gregory Paul means that Guanlingsaurus might have been a suction feeder, like short-snouted cetaceans. Darren Naish, in Historical Sea Reptiles, claims that Guanlingsaurus “lacks the options required for suction-feeding. Its jaws are too lengthy and slender to generate suction, and the hyoids will not be giant sufficient to permit the enlargement of the throat wanted for suction-feeding both.” What Guanlingsaurus and different short-snouted shastasaurs have been doing with their brief, toothless jaws, stays a thriller.
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With this determine, PNSO has precisely created the Guanlingsaurus physique plan as outlined above. The determine is an nearly equivalent match to the mannequin on show on the Guizhou Geological Museum. Some elements of the toy are speculative, reminiscent of the scale and placement of the dorsal fin and higher lobe of the caudal fin, however these would have been delicate tissue constructions for which we’ve got no stays however have been seemingly current. Because of some paleo-art depicting Guanlingsaurus with giant fore flippers, some have steered that the PNSO mannequin is inaccurate, however it appears to check nicely with the fossil specimens that I’ve seen photographs of on-line.
The PNSO Guanlingsaurus measures 12” (30.48 cm) lengthy when measured from the snout to the tip of the decrease lobe on the tail. The precise Guanlingsaurus reached a size of about 33’ (10.06 meters) which might put the mannequin at 1/33 in scale. The determine is known as Yuanlin, which implies “the spherical woodland” and likewise occurs to be the title of a metropolis in Taiwan. Yuanlin is introduced in a static pose with the tail gently sweeping in direction of the fitting. It comes with two help rods.
Being a marine reptile, the determine is pretty clean, streamlined, and low on element. Solely the flippers have any texture, within the type of irregularly formed scales that give them a cracked-earth look. The underlying musculature is properly conveyed, notably alongside the again and tail. A seam runs beneath the mouth that may be distracting when viewing the determine up shut.
Yuanlin has a reasonably conservative, counter shaded colour scheme. It’s painted a cloudy grey colour that’s darker dorsally and transitions to a light-weight grey underside. A light-weight grey stripe runs from the chin, up over the flipper, after which again right down to the stomach, and a small stripe branches off and factors in direction of the dorsal fin. Previous the dorsal fin, darkish grey stripes run alongside the again and transition to bands alongside the decrease lobe of the tail. Each lobes of the tail are tipped in mild grey. General, the colour scheme may be very harking back to numerous shark species, with the striping reminding me of the tiger shark particularly. The eyes are brown with black pupils.
With their Guanlingsaurus, PNSO delivers one other top quality, oddball taxa, and one from the Triassic as well! These are the form of fashions I get probably the most excited for and for me, PNSO’s run of marine reptiles (and one feathered dinosaur) have been probably the most thrilling choices of 2025. In case your curiosity in prehistory extends previous dinosaurs otherwise you’re a marine reptile aficionado, Yaunlin ought to undoubtedly discover its manner into your assortment.
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