10: Deadly Sea Scorpion in China Scientists in China recently discovered the
fossilized remains of a terrifying monster from the sea.
The creature once grew to over three feet (.9 m) in length and looked like a massive
scorpion.
It had an enlarged back limb covered in spines, just like a scorpion’s tail, which it used
to ensnare its prey.
The creature, known simply as a sea scorpion, is part of the mixopterid family of eurypterids.
They may look like our modern scorpions with huge front claws and an enlarged tail.
However, these things lived millions of years ago – and they aren’t even closely related
to scorpions.
In total, researchers uncovered 3 fossils of this very distinct predator.
They believe it lurked in the shallow waters near what is today South China between 419
and 444 million years ago.
What's truly fascinating is that even eons after prehistoric swimming scorpions of massive
proportions ultimately went extinct, we still have the much smaller modern versions of scorpions
today in almost every part of the planet.
Life still managed to reemerge in almost the same form, mind you a lot smaller and far
less terrifying.
9: The Turtle of Transylvania In the Transylvania region of Romania, scientists
made an incredible prehistoric discovery.
They came across the fossilized remains of a species of ancient turtle that had survived
the asteroid that killed off the dinosaurs.
This amazing, never-before-seen Transylvanian turtle lived 70 million years ago and didn’t
fully go extinct until 57 million years ago.
What makes this discovery particularly incredible?
This timing means that even after the asteroid struck our planet, and caused a mass extinction
event, this turtle species survived, and continued on, unaffected.
It wasn't that big, only about 7 inches long.
However, this tiny but mighty reptile survived when the dinosaurs and other beasts of the
Cretaceous Period were dying off en masse. 75% of all species on Earth, along with 100%
of non-avian dinosaurs, were wiped out by the six-mile (9.65 km) asteroid.
But not the Transylvanian turtle.
This discovery has led to an interesting new theory.
The team published their findings in the scientific Journal of Systematic Paleontology, saying
they believe the turtle’s survival had to do with proximity.
They believe that because the turtle was so much farther away from the impact site, it
had a better chance of surviving.
The asteroid hit Mexico, and this turtle lived in Eastern Europe.
Certain species groups that died in America managed to barely scrape by in Europe because
it was so far from ground zero – especially semi-aquatic creatures like turtles.
Among the other amazing discoveries in Transylvania have been dwarf dinosaurs and giant flying
pterosaurs.
The whole area used to be an island in the middle of the Tethys Sea, and so it's abundant
with rare monster fossils!
8: The Tuatara Scientists have discovered the most ancient
reptile still living and breathing today.
It's called the tuatara, and all of its friends are long dead.
This creepy reptile crawled out of the primordial goo about 190 million years ago and is still
thriving in our world.
It looks like a lizard, it moves a lot like a lizard, and it even sunbathes and eats insects
like a lizard.
But considering how old the tuatara is – it’s not technically a lizard at all.
It's a mysterious creature which belongs to a group of reptiles called sphenodontia.
The first of its kind spawned sometime around 230 million years before today, possibly even
as far back as 259 million years ago.
Scientists don't know exactly how many of these mysterious reptiles once lived on our
planet.
What they do know is that the tuatara is the only one left.
Paleontologist Tiago Simoes was involved with the team of researchers who recently studied
the tuatara fossil and learned of its exceptional lifespan.
Tiago recently told reporters that he and his team don't know how the creature managed
to stay alive for so long, especially since it hasn't really diversified since it originally
evolved.
In other words, it hasn't changed almost any part of itself in over 190 million years.
And just like the turtle from Transylvania, it survived the extinction of the dinosaurs.
In fact, it even migrated to New Zealand after the great extinction 66 million years ago.
How or why it managed to do this though remains a mystery.
These days, the tuatara can only be found in New Zealand.
But fossils have been discovered all the way on the other side of the world in Arizona.
The creature probably once lived across huge parts of the Earth, and now has a tiny habitat
on an island at the bottom of the world.
7: The Terrifying Truth of the Velociraptor The velociraptor is one of the most misunderstood
dinosaurs that ever existed.
Paleontologists have uncovered fossils of these majestic creatures only in Central Asia
and China.
In North America and South America, they've discovered related species, cousins and distant
relatives of the original velociraptor, but not the velociraptors themselves, contrary
to popular belief.
Additionally, the velociraptor looked nothing like how it's been portrayed in movies since
the 90s.
It wasn't a sly, prowling lizard with rough skin and demonic eyes.
It was actually more like a giant turkey with bright feathers and a bad attitude.
Another major misconception?
The velociraptor was less than half the size it was portrayed to be in the movie Jurassic
Park.
It's true that there were other, larger raptors like the Utahraptor and the Deinonychus.
But the real velociraptor was only about six feet (1.8 m) long from the tip of its tail
to the point of its nose.
Paleontologists call it a mid-sized feathered theropod, or a land eagle.
But if there's one thing film makers did get right, it's that the velociraptor was a true
predator.
Even though it was only the size of a miniature poodle, it was feisty and fast and had the
brains to back it up.
Experts described the velociraptor as a hybrid between a modern wolf and a cassowary.
6: The Ritualistically Beheaded Beast Researchers discovered the remains of a gigantic
crocodile that lived in China 3000 years ago.
They believe this monster had been ritualistically beheaded in a bizarre ceremony.
Here's the full story.
Experts came across the fossilized remains of two crocodilians in China, each of them
killed between 3000 and 3400 years ago.
Never before had such creatures been discovered, and researchers soon learned they belong to
an entirely new species.
The species was likely driven to extinction by humans just a few hundred years ago after
being hunted mercilessly over several millennia.
The species has been named Hanyusuchus sinensis in honor of a poet from the 9th century.
The truly bizarre part of all this is that the remains were found with extensive evidence
of violence.
They had obviously been killed by humans, but not for the purpose of eating.
They had likely been beheaded, and researchers have assumed it was part of some bizarre ritual.
This entirely unknown species, very similar to gharials, had probably been used in rituals
for thousands of years – so frequently that they were hunted to extinction.
What kind of ritual do you think involved sacrificing prehistoric crocodiles – beasts
over 19 feet (5.7 m) long?
I’d love to hear your theories in the comments, and don't forget to hit subscribe before the
end of the video!
5: Ancient Octopuses A newly discovered fossil is suggesting octopuses
were around before the dinosaurs.
Scientists recently uncovered what they believe to be the oldest known ancestor of the octopus,
a fossilized aquatic creature that lived 330 million years ago in Montana.
Of course, this was during a time when Montana was completely covered with ocean.
Believe it or not, most of modern Montana was once a shallow, tropical ocean bay – the
perfect habitat for octopuses.
This wasn't a huge beast.
It grew less than six inches (15 cm) and had ten limbs, two more than modern octopuses.
According to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, the discovery has pushed
the ancestry of the octopus back an extra 100 million years.
It now looks like the octopus is one of the oldest things still alive on this planet.
It came about long before dinosaurs ever evolved, and survived every great extinction event
since.
This new octopus is a vampyropod.
Not only is it an ancient ancestor of the octopus, but it's also the ancient ancestor
of the vampire squid.
It was named Syllipsimopodi bidini after President Joe Biden.
I’m sure the President is quite flattered to have an ancient ancestor of the vampire
squid name in his honor, don’t you think?
What would YOU name a new species if you could?
Let me know in the comments below!!
4: Prehistoric Birds Near the Great Wall of China, researchers
have discovered what has been described as “a lost world” of prehistoric birds.
One of the newly discovered species had tiny peg-like teeth and a movable chin like a pincer.
Another was a toothless bird that looked almost identical to its modern descendants.
The team uncovered over 100 specimens just 80 miles (128 km) from the western border
of the Great Wall.
These specimens lived around 120 million years ago, during the height of the age of the dinosaurs.
Even more bizarre is that the bird fossils were found in an ancient graveyard at the
archaeological site of Changma!
There are too many specimens to delve into each one in great detail.
But we can talk about the strangest of them all, the Brevidentavis.
This ancient bird had a flexible, bony appendage at the tip of its lower jaw which it used
to hunt prey.
It's what the professionals call an ornithuromorph bird with teeth.
It had tiny fangs in its mouth and a bizarre dangly thing hanging off where its chin would
be, if birds had chins.
This dangly thing worked as a feeler to help find prey.
The bird could actually feel through it, detecting any nearby creatures that it could eat.
Finally, scientists found proof of the Archaeopteryx, what they believe was the first legitimate
bird of 150 million years ago.
It was a kind of bridge creature between predatory dinosaurs like velociraptors and more modern
birds, like your standard seagulls. 3: Fossilized Heart
For the first time in history, scientists can finally study the heart of a fish that
lived around 119 million years ago.
The fish, whose skeleton was found in Brazil, is called a Rhacolepis.
It's the first time a fossilized heart has been discovered belonging to any prehistoric
animal.
This is incredible for a whole host of reasons.
As you're probably already aware, fossils almost always consist only of vertebrates,
bones, and the occasional footprint.
This is the first time the soft tissue of a heart was found.
Normally, all organic material decays immediately after death.
Organs begin breaking down right away from bacterial interactions.
That's why only the skeleton remains.
But at the rare fossil deposit in Brazil, the Santana Formation, researchers uncovered
fish with soft parts, pieces of stomachs, and even muscle tissue.
The fish with the heart was found by researchers with the Brazilian Biosciences National Laboratory.
The discovery was only possible by using x-ray tomography to scan the fish fossil while it
was still stuck inside limestone rock.
Next, the heart was put together slice by slice using special digital software.
It was the same process used to reconstruct the preserved brain of an even older fish
discovered in North America, that was 300 million years old.
Researchers haven't discovered much information about the heart just yet.
But they are hoping that with more time, they'll be able to gain a deeper understanding of
evolutionary patterns and the development of soft organs in prehistoric animals.
2: Lizard in Amber Amber is a fancy term for fossilized tree
sap.
You might remember amber from the plotline of the movie Jurassic Park- in it they got
their special dino DNA from a mosquito found frozen in amber.
And while that's purely science fiction, creatures getting trapped in amber isn't.
In fact, it happens every day.
An insect is crawling on a tree, it gets stuck in some sticky sap, and that sap hardens to
create amber.
Scientists have already found plenty of preserved insects from the prehistoric days inside tough
shells of sap.
It’s extremely unusual, however, to find an entire lizard trapped in a hunk of Burmese
amber.
This fantastic specimen once clung to the side of a tree in the forest during the era
of both dinosaurs and dragonflies as big as your head buzzing in the sky.
It was only a juvenile when it accidentally ran into a huge glob of tree sap and couldn't
escape.
Over 100 million years later, it's still in almost the exact same condition it was when
it first got trapped.
The team who studied the frozen lizard had to approach it as if the creature were still
alive.
Not only could they study the skeleton, but they could look at everything from its double
eyelids to its trachea, thanks to its perfect preservation in the amber.
1: Fossil Within a Fossil The complete skeleton of a prehistoric marine
reptile was found by paleontologists in southwestern China.
It's a creature called an ichthyosaur, a prehistoric predator that cruised through the world's
oceans during the Mesozoic era and hunted with incredible ferocity.
This particular marine monster, which looked similar to a dolphin but with really sharp
teeth, lived roughly 237 million years ago.
But what makes it so fascinating is that when paleontologists looked inside of it, they
found a second creature fossilized in its belly.
After the ichthyosaur ate its last meal, it also took its last breath.
The monster died and ultimately became a fossil – with another fossil in its stomach.
As of right now, this is the biggest fossil that's ever been found in the stomach of a
prehistoric marine reptile.
It's become something of a revelation to paleontologists who previously thought ichthyosaurs only consumed
small prey, things such as cephalopods.
Now it seems they were eating much larger animals.
The thing in its belly was once a thalattosaur, yet another marine predator even larger than
modern humans.
Just imagine making a find like this with modern creatures!
Are you a big fan of prehistoric creatures and discoveries?
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