Crocodiles can always be equated with viciousness and coldness in our impression, and thriller horror movies such as "Killing Crocodile Pond" and "Prehistoric Crocodile" have deepened this impression. Compared to the crocodiles that lived on prehistoric Earth, most of the crocodiles on Earth today are little guys. In order to introduce the famous crocodiles in prehistory more comprehensively and systematically, the little robber dragon has sorted together the relevant popular science articles previously released to form the "prehistoric giant crocodile" series, hoping to satisfy everyone's curiosity about the prehistoric giant crocodile.
The sixth in the "Prehistoric Crocodile" series is the beaked crocodile, a type of long-billed crocodile that once lived in India.
In 1840, when the Opium War, which changed China's destiny, broke out, a mission led by British scientists Falconer and Cautley came to the wilderness of India to dig for fossils. During the excavations, a fossil belonging to the skull of a giant crocodile was found.
Illustration: Fossil sketch of beaked dragon, picture from the internet
The discovery of the giant skull fragments shocked the whole team, and everyone began to work hard to carry out larger-scale excavations at the fossil points, hoping to find more fossils. Unfortunately, despite more effort and sweat, no more fossils were found.
The fossils found in India were loaded on merchant ships bound for Britain almost immediately, and when the ships arrived in Britain, the fossils were sent to museums. Faulkner and Courtley studied their findings, which were apparently the jaws of a giant crocodile, and that they should have a long snout, similar to the fish-eating crocodiles that live in India.
Image note: The only fossil beaked crocodile, picture from the Internet
According to the characteristics of the fossil. Faulkner and Courtley established the genus Rhamphosuchus in 1840, meaning "crocodile with a beaked beak", and the model species was called "rhamphosuchus crassidens".
Since only the snout of beaked apatosaurs has been found, paleontologists can only apply it to modern crocodiles to speculate on its body length. At first, paleontologists thought that the beaked crocodile was similar to the Indian crocodile that also lived in India, but after calculating its body proportions, the beaked crocodile reached 15 to 18 meters long and weighed 20 tons, which is an unprecedented super crocodile.
Image note: Beaked crocodile compared to human body size, image from the network
As the study progressed, paleontologists found that the beaked crocodile was more closely related to the Malay crocodile, and its body length was re-estimated to be 8 to 11 meters, and it remained one of the largest crocodiles.
Caption: Restoration of the skull of a beaked crocodile, image from the Internet
Image note: Malay crocodile, picture from the internet
As the name suggests, the beaked crocodile has a long mouth with nearly 80 pointed teeth in its mouth, which are conical in shape and interlaced with each other. A pair of eyes growing on the top of the head, the beaked crocodile can simply expose the top of the head to the water to observe the surrounding environment. Like other crocodiles, the beaked crocodile has a bloated body and a wide and long tail behind it, and it relies on its large tail to swim in the water. The beaked crocodile has shorter limbs on either side of the body and webs between the toes.
In terms of appearance, the beaked crocodile may not be much different from the Malay crocodile, but it is larger and stronger.
Caption: Beaked crocodile living in water, image from the Internet
The beaked crocodile lived in the Miocene, between 23 million and 5 million years ago, and is distributed in the freshwater environment of Rivers, Lakes and Swamps in India. Despite their long snout, don't be fooled by the appearance of beak-billed crocodiles suitable for fish-eating, they are fierce predators. According to today's research on the feeding habits of Malay crocodiles, they not only eat fish, but also eat crab-eating monkeys, small shrew deer, wild boars, dogs, birds, monitor lizards, snakes, shrimps, etc., which means that beaked crocodiles will also feed on various animals living in freshwater and terrestrial environments at that time.
Caption: Beaked crocodile preying on large primates, image from the web
Beaked crocodiles chase fish and shrimp in the water, and also lurk in the water near the shore waiting for animals to come to drink. Due to the lack of relevant stratigraphic and ecological information, we cannot make a list of more animals that live with beaked crocodiles.
With its 11-meter body length, the beaked crocodile successfully entered the prehistoric crocodile club and is one of the largest crocodiles ever built, but its weight may be lower than that of the famous emperor crocodile, Prussian crocodile, dinosaur crocodile and so on. In the future, it is hoped that more fossil material of beaked crocodiles will be discovered so that we can have a clearer understanding of this giant crocodile.
Resources:
1.heilprin, angelo (1974). the geographical and geological distribution of animals: the international science series vol. 57. ayer publishing. isbn 0-405-05742-3.
2.head, j. j. (2001). "systematics and body size of the gigantic, enigmatic crocodyloid rhamphosuchus crassidens, and the faunal history of siwalik group (miocene) crocodylians". journal of vertebrate paleontology 21 (supplement to no. 3): 59a. doi:10.1080/02724634.2001.10010852.