Cartorhynchus
Cartorhynchus was a tiny, early marine reptile that lived about 248 million years ago. It had a short snout and big flippers, and scientists think it could walk a little on land, like a seal!1
When did it live?
How big was it?
How long was it?
How heavy was it?
about as heavy as a house cat🍌as heavy as 17 bananas🧱as long as 12 toy building bricks in a row🏊could swim the length of a big swimming pool (50 m) in 18 secondsHow big was Cartorhynchus compared to YOU?
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Fun facts
Cartorhynchus is one of the oldest known ichthyosauriforms, a group that includes ichthyosaurs.1
It had a very short snout, only half the length of the rest of its skull.2
Its flippers were unusually large and curved, which might have helped it move on land.1
The only fossil found is a nearly complete skeleton, stored at the Anhui Geological Museum.2
It lived during the Early Triassic period, about 248 million years ago, in a warm tropical sea.1
Cartorhynchus had a very large hyoid bone in its throat, which helped it suck in food.2
Most asked questions about Cartorhynchus
?How big was Cartorhynchus?
About 40 centimetres long, which is about the size of a small lizard. It weighed around 2 kilograms.3
?Could Cartorhynchus walk on land?
Yes, scientists think it could walk a little on land, like a seal. Its large, flexible flippers and short body helped it move on land.31
?What did Cartorhynchus eat?
It ate hard-shelled animals like shrimp, using suction feeding to vacuum them up. It had special molar-like teeth inside its jaws to crush them.34
?When did Cartorhynchus live?
It lived about 248 million years ago, during the Early Triassic period, soon after the big Permian-Triassic extinction.3
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For dino experts
- Scientific name
- Cartorhynchus
- Named by
- Motani et al. 20155
- Group
- Ichthyosaurs
- Family / clade
- Omphalosauridae5
- Classification
- Ichthyosauromorpha5
- Age of the rocks
- 249 to 247 million years ()5
- Rock formations
- Nanlinghu5
- Countries
- China5
- Fossil records
- 1 in the Paleobiology Database5
- Discovery
- Cartorhynchus was named by Ryosuke Motani and colleagues in 2015, based on a fossil found in a quarry in Anhui, China.5
- Still debated
- Scientists are not sure if Cartorhynchus could really walk on land, or if it spent all its time in the water.1
Where the facts come from
- A basal ichthyosauriform with a short snout from the Lower Triassic of China | Nature (nature.com)
- PBDB Taxon (paleobiodb.org)
- Cartorhynchus (en.wikipedia.org)
- First Amphibious "Sea Monster" Found; Fills Evolutionary Gap | National Geographic (nationalgeographic.com)
- Cartorhynchus in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.
Every fact on this page has a number that points to its source. If we got something wrong, sorry, we are dino fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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