How giant marine reptiles
terrorized the ancient seas
Ichthyosaurs were some of the largest and most mysterious predators to
ever prowl the oceans. Now they are giving up their secrets.
Extracts from article :
As discoveries started to pile up, he got
hooked. Fischer, now at the University of Liège, Belgium, and his colleagues
have since described seven surprising new ichthyosaurs, ranging from a
tuna-sized reptile with thin, sharp teeth1 to an
animal as big as a killer whale, with a beak like that of a swordfish2.
Fischer is part of an
ichthyosaur renaissance that is sweeping palaeontology. After ignoring them for
decades, more and more researchers have started to focus on the reptiles, which
were among the top predators in the seas for some 150 million years during the
days of the dinosaurs.
The swell of
research is starting to answer key questions about ichthyosaurs, such as how
and where they originated and how quickly they came to rule the oceans. The
group was even more diverse than once thought, ranging from early near-shore
creatures that undulated like eels to giants that cruised the open ocean by
swishing their powerful tails. “They could go anywhere, just like whales,”
Motani says. The biggest ones rivalled blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus)
in length and were the largest predators in the Triassic seas.
Read more here : http://www.nature.com/news/how-giant-marine-reptiles-terrorized-the-ancient-seas-1.21722
Nessie seekers will
be interested in the ones that undulated like eels.
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