A fossil trove discovered in Wyoming offers some of the best examples so far from an old kind of alligator-sized amphibians. But while paleontologists describe the specimens as ‘beautifully preserved’, the reason remains a mystery behind their rapid death. The find was detailed in a study published on 2 April in the magazine Plos One.
Metoposaurid Tenospondylen are some of the first ancestors of contemporary frogs, toads and salamanders. The oldest well -known species in North America, Buettnererpeton Bakeriexisted exclusively on the continent during the Trias era about 230 million years ago. The squat, four -legged animal lurking in the lurking in freshwater ponds, rivers and lakes, where it essentially feeded everything that it could fit into his mouth.
“Like other metoposaurids, it probably brought most, if not all, of his life eating in the water, other amphibians, or something that is unhappy enough to venture into the water too far,” told University of Wisconsin-Madison Paleolontologists and studied co-authors Dave Lovelace and Aaron Kufner against Popular science.
Furthermore, not much is known about it Buettnererpeton Because of the scarcity of fossils. But according to Lovelace and Kufner, that can soon change thanks to their excavation work at the old floodplains location Nobby Knob in Dubois, Wyoming. There, paleontologists found dozens of fossilized Buettnererpeton Remains – more than double the total number of well -known copies. But these trias -age of amphibia fossils did not collect for decades or centuries. Instead, they seem to have died during a single massortal event.
“It was a local death as we see when rivers dry up, or when lakes have inflow of nutrients that cause algae blooms, both of which can kill the water life as fish,” explained Lovelace and Kufner.
This specific dying evidence is striking from others because of the rock in which it was found. The fine-grained soil and layered sediments indicate a low energy or calm deposit environment, which means that a lack of strong currents. Thanks to this, many of the skeletons have been largely intact and well preserved.
“There are some articulated bones that are almost absent in other metoposaurid bone beds in North America, and completely unknown to Buettnererpeton“The paleontologists said.
New details include the discovery of articulated toothy plates that were embedded in the soft tissue of BuettnererpetonThe mouth, as well as the unique way in which other fossils formed.
“They all miss some proof of the calcium carbonate that the majority of them would have formed [fossil] Shell … what seems to have happened is that the calcium carbonate dissolved after being buried, and the outer organic layer (which helps prevent the scale from dissolving in fresh water to dissolve during life) left an impression when the mud changed that rock was lost later, “they explained,” they explained.
According to the authors of the study, the mass graph was probably due to the existence of a nearby Buettnererpeton Colony, or a limited waterway induced by drought that concentrated them together before they died.
“This assembly is a snapshot of a single population instead of accumulation over time,” Kufner said in a separate explanation.
The research team hopes that their excavation work and taphonomic analysis (the study of death and subsequent preservation of an organism) will lead to future investigations of the site. Further studies can also understand our understanding Buettnererpeton And the environment in which it lived.
“Tipehonomic studies nowadays are commonplace and much more than 50 years ago thanks to the work of dozens, if not hundreds of geologists and paleontologists,” said Kufner and Lovelace, adding: “There is still plenty to do!”
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