Pterodactyl Courtship—dabs of Color
According to the rules of ecology and animal behavior, pterodactyls may also have displayed splashes of bright color. Animals with large eyes and great powers of visual discrimination use color to communicate with each other. For example, today's bird species see a wider range of colors than humans do, and most birds use some sort of bright color patterns in the courtship season to attract mates. Dabs of red ornament the beaks of gulls, and circles of lively colors highlight the eyes of male puffins during the breeding season.
Like birds, pterodactyls must have had good vision. As long ago as the 1880's, pterodactyl skulls were found with the brain shape preserved as an impression in the sediment filling the braincase. The fossils showed that the pterodactyl brain was nothing like a reptile's brain. Instead, it possessed two birdlike features. One was the presence of huge frontal lobes, the halves of the forebrain where higher intellectual functions are carried out. The other feature was the existence of very large optic lobes (vision centers in certain animal brains), proof of exceptional vision. Pterodactyl brain impressions found in the 1980's confirmed the bird-style brain organization. So it would be logical to conclude that, like modern birds, pterodactyls used color for courtship.
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