Eotitanosuchus

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Eotitanosuchus
Fossil range: Permian

Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Synapsida
Order: Therapsida
Family: Eotitanosuchidae
Tchudinov, 1960
Genus: Eotitanosuchus
Species: E. olsoni
Binomial name
Eotitanosuchus olsoni
Tchudinov, 1960

Eotitanosuchus olsoni ("Olson's dawn giant crocodile") was a mammal-like "reptile" occurring in the town of Ochyor in Perm Krai, Russia, in channel flood deposits along with Biarmosuchus tener, Estemmenosuchus uralensis and Estemmenosuchus mirabilis. It lived about 255 mya and was a very large animal; although the skull usually shown is about 35 cm long, this belongs to a juvenile, it is estimated that the adult skull would be about 1 meter long.

Eotitanosuchus skull.
Eotitanosuchus skull.

Like Biarmosuchus tener, it was primitive in that, though it was a predator, the temple opening behind the eye was small, giving it a weak bite. The temple was, however, larger at the top than in the biarmosuchians.

[edit] References

  • Chudinov, P. K. 1965, "New Facts about the Fauna of the Upper Permian of the USSR", Journal of Geology, 73:117-30
  • Olsen, E. C., 1962, Late Permian terrestrial vertebrates, USA and USSR Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, new series, 52: 1–224.
  • Patricia Vickers-Rich and Thomas H. Rich, The Great Russian Dinosaurs, Gunter Graphics, 1993, Pg 28.

[edit] External links


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