Ningcheng County, Chifeng City, located at the junction of the three provinces of Mongolia and Hebei, here not only shines with the thousand-year-old Liaozhongjing culture, but also a widely developed Mesozoic strata. In the Ningcheng National Geopark, there are extremely rich and exquisite remnants of ancient life - fossils of Middle Jurassic paleontology dating back about 165 million years. Ningcheng is also known as "the paradise of ancient life and the treasure house of fossils in the world".
Ningcheng National Geopark contains fossil stratigraphic profiles
At the end of the last century, paleontologists found a large number of feathered dinosaurs, early angiosperm pioneer molecules and an extremely large number of insect fossils in Daohugou, Ningcheng County, which is very rare that these fossils preserve the soft tissue characteristics of many organisms, so that Daohugou is famous all over the world, and the paleontological groups found here are also named "Daohugou Biota".
So far, the Daohugou biota has found more than 20 paleontological fossils such as fish, reptiles, birds, mammals, insects, ginkgo biloba, angiosperms, etc., of which more than 1,000 species of insect fossils.
Daohugou Paleontological Fossil Conservation Museum is currently the largest paleontological fossil in situ conservation museum in Asia.
Ancient Life Paradise The treasure trove of fossils in the world
Many of the world's unique fossils of paleontology are preserved here, including the world's earliest mammal that learned to swim, the otter-shaped tanuki, whose discovery pushed the history of mammals' adaptation to water life forward by 110 million years; and the mammal that first flew into the sky, the ancient flying mammal, which was the only flying mammal of its era with dinosaurs, whose discovery pushed the history of flying mammals forward by at least 70 million years.
Otter-shaped tanuki-tailed beast
Ancient flying beasts, combining the characteristics of squirrels and bats. It is covered with hairs all over its body and has wing membranes between its limbs, allowing it to glide among the trees. The beast is 12–14 cm long, weighs a very light body, only about 70 grams, and lives by eating small insects. The Ancient Flying Beasts had long since become extinct, and had not left any descendants. But the fossil is so well preserved that even traces of hair and wing membranes are clearly visible.
There is also the earliest freshwater lamprey eel - Meng's mesozoic eel, which is known as the Mesozoic vampire, foraging with suction cup-like mouth adsorbed on other fish bodies, with the sucker mouth on both sides of the teeth and the teeth on the tongue to break the fish body, sucking its blood and flesh, sometimes the sucked fish finally only a skeleton.
Meng's middle eel
Mammalian megalodons, the first primitive mammals discovered by paleontologists. It has a complete skull and skeleton, and there are many hair marks around the skeleton, which is an important discovery in the fossils of the small thief tribe.
The First Salamander has a tailed amphibian. Its discovery, which rewrote the origin of the precious species "baby fish" from the Americas to the Asian continent, is the earliest known crested group of salamanders.
In the Daohugou paleontology, scholars also found for the first time pterosaurs with primitive "feathers" - Ningcheng Rehe Pterodactyl and Ningcheng Tree Dragon.
The Ningcheng Rehe Pterodactyl fossil is one of the best preserved specimens of wing membrane and hair in the world. Hairy skin derivatives of Thermophodylosaurus can be clearly seen, from the abdomen to the shoulders, neck, and tail, all over the body. According to the analysis, this whole body distribution of "hair" may be to regulate body temperature, or to enhance flight ability, silence when catching prey in flight, and so on.
The Ningcheng tree is a small individual, and if the long tail is not considered, it is only the size of a sparrow. The age of the life of the dendriosaurus and the characteristics suitable for living in trees indicate that theropod dinosaurs began to live in trees before the proliferation of Early Cretaceous birds. This discovery further refines the hypothesis that birds originated from dinosaurs, and further supports the arboreal origin theory of bird flight. The ancestors of birds are more likely to be a group of taxons that live in trees than a group of species that run on the ground.
Fossil and restoration of Daohugou foot feather dragon. " Apatosaurus " lived in the Late Jurassic , with a body length of about 1 m , a new genus of the genus first discovered. The specimen preserves the intact tibia to toe area, where the feathers are clearly visible. The discovery of Apatosaurus not only reaffirms the view that "bird ancestors are dinosaurs", but also greatly supports the arboreal origin theory.
Fossils of Psittacosaurus. Two large psittaciosaurs wrapped their bodies around five small psittaciosaurs, reminiscent of their panic and fear when disaster suddenly struck, and the loving nature of adult dinosaurs to protect their cubs in times of crisis.
In the Mesozoic Ningcheng, there were also a wide variety of insects, which shared the earth with the huge dinosaurs. The Daohugou biota is one of the most diverse insect fossils in the world, and the insect fossils that "crawl" from here open a window for the world to understand insects in the age of dinosaurs.
The Ginkgo Jurassic Scorpion, the oldest mimetic insect of the fern leaf, is known as the "Ginkgo biloba with legs", and their body shape is very similar to that of some species of ginkgo biloba leaves at that time. The discovery pushes the history of insect leaf mimicry forward by 120 million years.
The Jurassic Bride Spider is the largest spider fossil ever found in the world, with a head-tail extension of up to 15 cm. Known for their ability to weave huge golden webs, these spiders are adept at catching bats and small birds. Spiders of its kind still exist on Earth today.
Zhao repaired the dragonfly, the single wing length of 107.6 mm, width of 14.3 mm, according to which it is inferred that the dragonfly wings spread up to 225 mm, is the "air overlord" of the Mesozoic period, is also the largest species of dragonflies known in China, the world's fourth largest dragonfly.
Smooth Cryptoptera, paleontologists have discovered a fact that has amazed and surprised them by looking at the fossils — that over a long period of 165 million years, the smooth Cryptoptera in the process of continuous evolution has changed little, only very slight differences — the living Smooth Cryptoptera has small cracks in the forebreast that they did not have 165 million years ago. In addition, their individuals have become slightly smaller, and the fossils of smooth cryptoptera from 165 million years ago are about 1 cm long, while the current smooth cryptoptera is about 0.6-0.7 cm long. Paleontologists refer to this phenomenon as "morphological evolutionary stagnation behavior," which speculates that it has a lot to do with the long-held habits of cryptoptera.
Giant fleas, usually about 1.5 cm in length, some species can even exceed 2 cm. Their discovery advanced the fossil record of fleas by more than 40 million years and revealed the origin of fleas.
Fossil horror insects, named for their frightening appearance, are "close relatives" of a rare modern mosquito, the Vaderidopterus vacanthoptera.
dù is the earliest known fossil record of the Dermatophyllaceae.
The ancient Australian mushroom (xùn) carapaceae is the earliest known fossil record of the Age of the Australian mushroom family, and is likely to be a pollinator of cycads at that time.
In addition to animal fossils, the Daohugou biota also contains a large number of plant fossils, including the new species of angiosperms - Huhan Guo, the earliest known herbaceous seed plants - Boda Jurassic grass, and a large number of Cypress plants. Their discoveries have important indicative significance for the study of paleoclimate and paleoenvironment.
Fossil huego, a 164-million-year-old flowering plant, consists of interconnected roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits, and seeds inside the fruit. Linear leaves spiral on a curved stem with five or six parallel veins. There are more than 20 fruits, arranged in a spiral in the fruit sequence, and each fruit contains a seed.
Huhango's discovery in the Middle Jurassic pushed forward the origin of flowering plants by nearly 40 million years, rewriting the evolutionary history of flowering plants and providing new evidence for studying the evolution of early angiosperms.
Fossil jurassic grass, although less than 4 cm tall, is well preserved, including connected roots, stems, leaves, and fruits. The discovery of The Jurassic grass, produced in the Middle Jurassic, is currently the earliest herbaceous seed plant, prompting a re-examination of the evolutionary history of angiosperms.
According to the excavated fossil materials, scientists have revealed for the first time the leaf stratum corneum, in situ pollen, in situ ovules and other fine anatomical information of the Australian fir genus, supplementing the gap in the microscopic anatomy research of the Cypress fossil genus, making the australopithecus austerus one of the most completely preserved and studied Jurassic cypress plant taxa so far, which is of great significance for the comprehensive understanding of the ancestral or early populations of the Cypress family and their morphology and species diversity.
Ningcheng, the hot land that records the legend of biological evolution, is a large encyclopedia that explores ancient mysteries and deciphers the changes of life, where hundreds of millions of years of time have been precipitated and solidified, waiting for you to clear the fog of life evolution.
Source: Visual Chifeng
Editor: Zhang Yun
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