In Australia, a massive marine reptile’s skeleton dating back 100 million years has been discovered, giving scientists hope that they will find significant proof of prehistoric life.
Amateur fossil hunters discovered the 6 m tall young long-necked pleiosaur, also known as an elamsaurus, in August on a cattle station in Queensland.
The Eromaga Sea, which covered much of the Australian inland with 50-meter-deep water around 150 million years ago, was home to the elasmosaurs, which were 8 to 10 meters long.
Paleontologists may learn more in-depth information on the genesis, evolution, and ecology of the Cretaceous period in the area thanks to the discovery of a body and a head, he said, adding that this could be important for studies in the field in the future.
The head of pleiosaurs frequently separated from the body after they died because the neck made up two-thirds of them, which made finding an intact fossil very challenging.
When an elasmosaurus died, according to Knutsen, its rotting body was inflated with gases, which allowed it to rise to the water’s surface. When the cadaver was preyed upon by predators, the head was frequently broken off.
However, the specimen is in good shape, and scientists will examine the teeth to conduct chemical analyses that could reveal details about the environment it lived in, its nutrition, and if it had ever moved or had lived permanently in one location.
Pleiosaurs and ichthyosaurs, two extinct marine reptiles that lived in the same time period as dinosaurs, are not considered to be dinosaurs. Because they were descended from land-dwelling creatures, plesiosaurs lacked gills and occasionally had to surface for breath. How long they may be submerged is still a mystery.
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