Pterosauria

Pterosaurs
Pterosaurs first evolved in the Triassic Period and were the first vertebrates to evolve powered flight. They are not dinosaurs but they are close relatives of them as evidenced by the coat of protofeathers on their bodies and wings. They reached the hight of their success during the Early Cretaceous, when their ranks included the tiny insect eating anurognathids,the pig like dsungaripteroids, filter feeding ctenochasmids, fruit eating tapejarids, terrestrial chaoyangopterids and many more. However an extinction event near the begining of the Late Cretaceous caused by a rapid and severe rise in global temperatures decimated these flying reptiles. Once conditions once again stabilized there were only two groups of pterosaurs left, the primarily piscivorous Ornithocheiroids and the terrestrial predatory Azhdarchids. Of these the former continued to decline while the latter had an explosive radiation. The radiation of azhdarchids was interupted by the thick forests that covered the earth during the Early Eocene but thrived once cooling temperatures replaced most of these forests with open woodlands and grasslands. There are roughly 100 living species of pterosaur, all of which are azhdarchids.

Azhdarchids