In Winton, Australia, researchers have found a Cretaceous crocodile with a dinosaur stuck in its stomach. The find provides new information about the food chain of the time.
Winton – Dinosaurs ruled life on Earth for almost 200 million years – until they became extinct 65 million years ago. Fossils can still be found today that tell stories about the times when the imposing lizards dominated the animal world. In Australia, researchers at the University of New England have now published an explosive discovery: partially digested remains of a dinosaur were discovered in the stomach of a fossilized crocodile from the Cretaceous period (93 million years ago).
If you now have a picture of a titan duel in front of you, in which a crocodile fought against a mighty dinosaur, you will unfortunately have to be disappointed: Neither the crocodile nor the dinosaur were particularly big – the dinosaur was just about the size of a chicken. According to iflscience.de , it was a small, so-called ornithopod dinosaur. The crocodile has a previously unknown genus, which is now called “Confractusuchus sauroktonos” – which means something like “killer of broken dinosaurs”.
The crocodile’s last prey: Bone analysis confirms suspicion
Evidence on the dinosaur’s bones strengthened the suspicion that the crocodile either killed its last prey itself or ate it shortly after death. As research leader Matt White explained to iflscience.de , the two fossils were too closely intertwined to remove one without damaging the other. Instead, the team creates 3D models of each bone using micro-CT scanners. In doing so, they confirmed that the dinosaur was indeed the crocodile’s last meal.
According to the investigations, the crocodile was about 2.5 meters long – small by Cretaceous standards – while the dinosaur is said to have weighed just 1 to 1.7 kilograms. One of his femurs was broken in two by a powerful bite, while the other bore the distinct imprint of a crocodile tooth.
Crocodile died after eating dinosaur – did another dinosaur attack it?
Why the crocodile died shortly after eating the dinosaur remains a mystery to the researchers. With its tail missing, research leader White suspects that a larger dinosaur may have taken revenge on the crocodile for the action. The discovery not only provided the first evidence that crocodiles ate dinosaurs, but also showed that “dinosaurs were an important resource in the Cretaceous ecological food web,” says White. The explosive fossil was excavated in 2010.
There are always bizarre finds that provide information about the life of the dinosaurs. In Yorkshire, a woman found a dinosaur footprint* while walking on the beach ( BW24* reported ) and also in China a discovery rewrote the history of the dinosaurs*. *BW24 is an offer from IPPEN.MEDIA.
