Haptodus

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Haptodus
Fossil range: late Carboniferous (Gzhelian) to Early Permian

Haptodus

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Synapsida
Order:	Pelycosauria
(unranked)	Eupelycosauria
(unranked)	Sphenacodontia
Genus:	Haptodus

Species

H. garnettensis
?H. grandis
?H. beylei

Haptodus was a small sphenacodont, a lineage that includes therapsids. It was at least 1.5 meters (5 ft.) in length. It lived from Latest Carboniferous to Early Permian, in the equatorial Pangea. It was a medium-sized predator, feeding on insects and small vertebrates. It is one of the most primitive sphenacodontid and it is related to other sphenacodontids (or it may have been ancestral to them), such as Dimetrodon. It shares many structural features of the skull and skeleton with the more specialised sphenacodontids. Unlike Dimetrodon, it lacked the "sail".