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Instead, they primarily relied on stratigraphic associations and Cuvier's 1808 research on the holotype skull. Thus, in-depth research on the placement of Mosasaurus was not undertaken until the discovery of more complete mosasaur fossils during the late 19th century, which reignited research on the placement of mosasaurs among squamates. [8]
Mosasaurus was a common large predator in these oceans and was positioned at the top of the food chain. Paleontologists believe its diet would have included virtually any animal; it likely preyed on bony fish, sharks, cephalopods, birds, and other marine reptiles including sea turtles and other mosasaurs. It likely preferred to hunt in open ...
The Mosasaurus hoffmannii skull found in Maastricht between 1770 and 1774. The first publicized discovery of a partial fossil mosasaur skull in 1764 by quarry workers in a subterranean gallery of a limestone quarry in Mount Saint Peter, near the Dutch city of Maastricht, preceded any major dinosaur fossil discoveries, but remained little known.
The team initially suspected the specimen to be the oldest known Mosasaurus, but further preparation uncovered features indicating a new intermediate genus and species between Mosasaurus and the more primitive Clidastes. [1] The study, published in 2023, named the species Jormungandr walhallaensis.
Tylosaurus proriger mounted skeleton in the Rocky Mountain Dinosaur Resource Center in Woodland Park, Colorado. This list of mosasaurs is a comprehensive listing of all genera that have ever been included in the family Mosasauridae or the parent clade Mosasauroidea, excluding purely vernacular terms.
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The Mosasaurinae are a subfamily of mosasaurs, a diverse group of Late Cretaceous marine squamates.Members of the subfamily are informally and collectively known as "mosasaurines" and their fossils have been recovered from every continent except for South America.
The enormous and varied appetite of Tylosaurus can be demonstrated in a 1987 find that identified fossils of a mosasaur measuring 2 meters (6.6 ft) or longer, the diving bird Hesperornis, a Bananogmius fish, and possibly a shark all within the stomach of a single T. proriger skeleton (SDSM 10439) recovered from the Pierre Shale of South Dakota.