Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Mammals and birds filled the empty niches left behind by the reptilian megafauna and, while reptile diversification slowed, bird and mammal diversification took an exponential turn. [44] However, reptiles were still important components of the megafauna, particularly in the form of large and giant tortoises .
Namaqua chameleon, by Hans Stieglitz. Vipera xanthina, by Benny Trapp. Leiocephalus personatus, by Holleday. Macrospondylus, by Didier Descouens. Ladder snake, by Benny Trapp (edited by Papa Lima Whiskey 2) Thamnophis elegans terrestris at Western terrestrial garter snake, by Steve Jurvetson.
The Reptiles Portal. Reptiles, as commonly defined, are a group of tetrapods with usually an ectothermic ('cold-blooded') metabolism and amniotic development. Living reptiles comprise four orders: Testudines ( turtles ), Crocodilia ( crocodilians ), Squamata ( lizards and snakes ), and Rhynchocephalia (the tuatara ).
e. Reptiles arose about 320 million years ago [1] during the Carboniferous period. Reptiles, in the traditional sense of the term, are defined as animals that have scales or scutes, lay land-based hard-shelled eggs, and possess ectothermic metabolisms. So defined, the group is paraphyletic, excluding endothermic animals like birds that are ...
Snakes are elongated, limbless reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (/ sɜːrˈpɛntiːz /). [2] Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more joints than their lizard ancestors, enabling them to swallow prey much larger than their heads ...
A white-headed dwarf gecko with shed tail. Reptiles are tetrapod animals in the class Reptilia, comprising today's turtles, crocodilians, snakes, amphisbaenians, lizards, tuatara, and their extinct relatives. The study of these traditional reptile orders, historically combined with that of modern amphibians, is called herpetology.
Crocodilia (or Crocodylia, both / krɒkəˈdɪliə /) is an order of semiaquatic, predatory reptiles known as crocodilians. They first appeared during the Late Cretaceous and are the closest living relatives of birds. Crocodilians are a type of crocodylomorph pseudosuchian, a subset of archosaurs that appeared about 235 million years ago and ...
A mammal (from Latin mamma 'breast') [1] is a vertebrate animal of the class Mammalia (/ məˈmeɪli.ə /). Mammals are characterized by the presence of milk -producing mammary glands for feeding their young, a broad neocortex region of the brain, fur or hair, and three middle ear bones.