A strange creature found along the banks of the Jiaolang River, with a “armored” body and a shape resembling a large submarine, is one of the first representatives of the “age of monsters” following the mass extinction of the Late Permian period.
According to Sci-News, a new marine reptile species named Prosaurosphargis yingzishanensi has been revealed in a quarry located in the Jiaolang River Formation in China, where several other ancient monsters have also been discovered.
Radiometric dating results indicate that it is 247 million years old, placing it in the Early Triassic period, which emerged after the previous mass extinction at the end of the Permian.
The monster was found in a fossil-rich area along the Jiaolang River in China – (Photo: eLife).
The Triassic period marks the beginning of the “age of monsters” on the planet, lasting through three geological periods: Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous, dominated by large reptiles such as dinosaurs on land, pterosaurs in the skies, and ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs in the seas…
Paleontologist Jun Liu from Hefei University of Technology (China) and colleagues from Germany, Poland, and China have researched this specimen, considered emblematic of this extremely vital transitional phase of the ecosystem.
“Some groups of reptiles invaded the marine realm as a consequence of the mass extinction at the end of the Permian, which is the largest mass extinction event in Earth’s history,” Dr. Liu stated.
Unlike their ancestors that transitioned from the ocean to land, the Triassic marine reptiles instead took an “opposite path,” evolving from land-dwelling creatures of the Permian.
The invasion of the seas by reptiles could have been a result of the oceans at that time being relatively quiet, as the mass extinction had nearly wiped out the previous generation of aquatic life.
Among these areas, the ocean region now part of China is one of the places where early ancient marine reptiles chose to thrive.
The specimen found represents a part of the monster’s body, indicating it had a body “clad in armor,” including robust ribs extending along its back and a thick, heavy skin armor.
With a body length of approximately 1.5 meters, it is quite large within the realm of early Triassic monsters, which had not yet developed to the gigantic sizes of the Cretaceous period.
This study has recently been published online in the journal eLife.
