An international team of scientists has identified the oldest fossil of a sea-going reptile from the Southern Hemisphere -- a nothosaur vertebra found on New Zealand's South Island. 246 million years ago, at the beginning of the Age of Dinosaurs, New Zealand was located on the southern polar coast of a vast super-ocean called Panthalassa.
An international team of scientists has identified the oldest fossil of a sea-going reptile from the Southern Hemisphere -- a nothosaur vertebra found on New Zealand's South Island. 246 million years ago, at the beginning of the Age of Dinosaurs , New Zealand was located on the southern polar coast of a vast super-ocean called Panthalassa.
Reptiles ruled the seas for millions of years before dinosaurs dominated the land. The most diverse and geologically longest surviving group were the sauropterygians, with an evolutionary history spanning over 180 million years. The group included the long-necked plesiosaurs, which resembled the popular image of the Loch Ness Monster. Nothosaurs were distant predecessors of the Plesiosaurs. They could grow up to seven metres long and swam using four paddle-like limbs.
The oldest nothosaur fossils are around 248 million years old and have been found along an ancient northern low-latitude belt that stretched from the remote northeastern to northwestern margins of the Panthalassa super-ocean. The origin, distribution and timing of when nothosaurs reached these distant areas are still debated. Some theories suggest that they either migrated along northern polar coastlines, or swam through inland seaways, or used currents to cross the Panthalassa super-ocean.
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New analysis determines ancient polar sea reptile fossil is oldest ever found in Southern HemisphereAn international team of scientists has identified the oldest fossil of a sea-going reptile from the Southern Hemisphere—a nothosaur vertebra found on New Zealand's South Island. 246 million years ago, at the beginning of the Age of Dinosaurs, New Zealand was located on the southern polar coast of a vast super-ocean called Panthalassa.
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