The Brotherhood of Leathery Wings goes to London

I’ve got a habit of withering on for ages when blogging, but that can’t be the case today: in a few short hours I’m off to London to install the University of Portsmouth/Royal Society ‘Pterosaurs: Dragons of the Air’ exhibition with my colleagues, Dave Martill and Bob Loveridge, along with a bunch of student labourers/slaves/groupies that we keep with us at all times. The last few weeks has seen us working like Japanese beavers trying to get everything finished (hence the lack of posts here) but, happily, we’ll be on display on London’s Southbank from the 25th of June to the 4th of July. More specifically, we can be found spread between the interior and exterior of Royal Festival Hall (see map, taken from a presentation I gave ages ago on the exhibition, below), not too far from Waterloo train station and the London Eye.


We’ve got 5 (count ‘em) giant azhdarchid models (two of which are standing on the ground as the world’s first Haenamichnus-inspired parasagittal terrestrial azhdarchid models), 13 pterosaur busts representing a broad sweep of their diversity, a life-size Pteranodon to have your photograph taken alongside and more information on pterosaurs than you could shake a stick at. It was a mammoth amount of work and special praise should be given to the students and other volenteers who put in so many hours in exchange for no more than a few pints of beer and, bizarrely, Southern Comfort and Coke (you know who you are). Simply put, these chaps were the cogs that helped our leathery-winged machine run smoothly, so they deserve considerable amounts of kudos, presents and praise.

You can meet our workforce at the exhibition and, in addition, we'll have several tamed pterosaur experts to chat to while you’re there. Along with myself, Dave and Bob, the likes of Darren Naish and Andre Veldmeijer will be dropping by to discuss all things pterosaurian. Two pterosaur-researching postgraduates from UoP, Richard Hing and Steven Vidovic, will also be on hand. The whole event, part of the biggest-ever Royal Society Summer Science Festival, is totally free to enjoy and should make for a great day out. It’d be fantastic to see some of the Pterosaur.Net readership there.


Right, I have to dash, but more on the exhibition will be posted when I get back. In the meantime, please enjoy two new images of giant azhdarchids penned back in January to advertise the exhibition. The image at the top shows our big male, Bamofo, terrorising some baby tyrannosaurus and, adjacent to this text, is the graceful Mistress swooping over a mudflat with bathing sauropods. See you all in London!