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A new study has revealed some of the interesting facts about the process of reproduction in Mosasaurs, the large marine lizards that have existed 65 million years ago.
According to the researchers, Mosasaurs gave birth in the open ocean water and not on rear coasts.
The main aim of the study was the focus on the initial environment of these iconic predators before they finally reached extinction. The giant marine lizards existed at the same time period as dinosaurs did.
For the study, the researchers collected the specimens of the youngest mosasaur ever found in the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History. The baby fossils were uncovered 100 years ago in the deposits of open oceans. The researchers, who had discovered these fossils at that time, have believed that they came from ancient birds.
Lead study author Daniel Field said, “Mosasaurs are among the most effective-studied groups of Mesozoic vertebrate animals, but evidence with regards to how they have been born and what baby mosasaur ecology was like has historically been elusive.”
Field and Aaron LeBlanc, a Ph.D student at the University of Toronto in Mississauga, discovered that different variety of teeth and jaw attributes were exhibited by the specimens.
According to LeBlanc, the only bird-like function in Mosasaurs specimens was their modest size. Eggs were laid by them on the beaches and newborn mosasaurs didn’t seem to have lived in sheltered near-shore nurseries, he said.
The findings of the study were reported in the journal Palaeontology.
