Do ichthyosaurs exist?

Do ichthyosaurs exist?

Ichthyosaurs (Ancient Greek for “fish lizard” – ἰχθύς or ichthys meaning “fish” and σαῦρος or sauros meaning “lizard”) are large extinct marine reptiles.

How big could ichthyosaurs get?

Fossils from the western United States and Canada indicate that some ichthyosaurs could exceed 13 metres (43 feet) in length. Deep-bodied and with long fins, these appear to have been ambush predators that fed on fishes.

Why do ichthyosaurs look like dolphins?

Gradually sharks, ichthyosaurs, and dolphins came to look alike because natural selection favored one particular shape over all others for rapid movement through the seas. Figure legend: Convergent Evolution. Although very different species, the dolphin and the icthyasaur look alike.

What killed the ichthyosaurs?

Ichthyosaurs – shark-like marine reptiles from the time of dinosaurs – were driven to extinction by intense climate change and their own failure to evolve quickly enough, according to new research by an international team of scientists.

What did ichthyosaurs evolved from?

terrestrial reptiles
They descended from terrestrial reptiles, conquered the open oceans, became agile hunters of fish and squid, and persisted over incredibly long 155 million years.

Has there ever been an animal bigger than a blue whale?

But now, a newly discovered ichthyosaur could give this normal-looking reptile a claim to fame as the largest animal that ever existed. If size estimates are accurate, this creature could have measured up to 26 meters (85 feet) long — for comparison, blue whales top out around 25 meters (82 feet).

Did dolphins evolve from ichthyosaurs?

Mesozoic “fish lizards”, ichthyosaurs were marine reptiles that independently became adapted to a life at sea around 200 million years before dolphins.

Are ichthyosaurs related to crocodiles?

The ancient fish-lizards called ichthyosaurs that swam the warm Mesozoic seas for more than 100 million years were sisters to present-day crocodiles, birds and snakes and to the dinosaurs, according to a new fossil analysis. All had a common terrestrial ancestor, said Ryosuke Motani of UC Berkeley.

What are ichthyosaurs known for?

Ichthyosaurs appear to provide an excellent opportunity to test the extent of predictability of evolutionary processes. They descended from terrestrial reptiles, conquered the open oceans, became agile hunters of fish and squid, and persisted over incredibly long 155 million years.

Why did the ichthyosaurs go extinct?

Was any dinosaur bigger than a blue whale?

Blue whales are the largest animals that ever lived on Earth . Titanosaur: Wow, that’s much more massive than the dinosaur whose fossils I was molded after. With flesh and bones, scientists think the titanosaur only weighed around 70 tons (140,000 pounds).

Did ichthyosaurs have gills?

In fact, from their streamlined, fishlike bodies, it seems almost certain that ichthyosaurs could not leave the water. Yet they still breathed air and lacked gills, like modern whales. Ichthyosaurs were not dinosaurs, but represent a separate group of marine vertebrates.