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The earliest marine reptiles arose in the Permian. During the Mesozoic many groups of reptiles became adapted to life in the seas, including ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, mosasaurs, nothosaurs, placodonts, sea turtles, thalattosaurs and thalattosuchians. Marine reptiles were less numerous after mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous.
Marine reptiles are reptiles which have become secondarily adapted for an aquatic or semiaquatic life in a marine environment. Only about 100 of the 12,000 extant reptile species and subspecies are classed as marine reptiles, including marine iguanas , sea snakes , sea turtles and saltwater crocodiles .
The blue whale is the largest animal known ever to have existed. [43] [44] [45] Some studies have estimated that certain shastasaurid ichthyosaurs and the ancient whale Perucetus could have rivalled the blue whale in size, with Perucetus also being heavier than the blue whale with a mean weight of 180 t (180 long tons; 200 short tons).
The blue whale is the largest animal on Earth and likely the largest animal ever to have lived. While this ocean mammoth is dubbed “blue,” its color is more a reflection of the water it swims ...
Scientists consider the blue whale, which grows up to 110 feet (33.5 meters) long, to be the largest known animal ever to exist on the planet. But it’s possible that the 202 million-year-old ...
Today, the 5,500 species of living synapsids, known as the mammals, include both aquatic and flying species, and the largest animal ever known to have existed (the blue whale). Humans are synapsids, as well. Most mammals are viviparous and give birth to live young rather than laying eggs with the exception being the monotremes.
There could be a new contender for heaviest animal to ever live. While today's blue whale has long held the title, scientists have dug up fossils from an ancient giant that could tip the scales.
For instance, descendants of the first reptiles include modern reptiles, mammals and birds; the agnathans have given rise to the jawed vertebrates; the bony fishes have given rise to the land vertebrates; a group of amphibians, the labyrinthodonts, have given rise to the reptiles (traditionally including the mammal-like synapsids), which in ...