Bipedal ancient crocodile remains discovered

[FfFfFfFF 58,111]

Over 110 Milllion years ago, during the Cretaceous period, the southern coastal area of South Korea, near the city Jinju, was covered by extensive lakes. The muddy shores were inhabited  by lizards, turtles, and dinosaurs, all of which left their tracks in the muck. 

In 2019  detailed imprints from an unkown crocodile-like creature were discovered, reported today in Scientific Reports. The tracks provide an impression of the animals’ toes, the pads on the bottoms of their feet, and even the occasional patch of skin. These details have convinced Lockley and his colleagues that the footprints likely were left by crocodile relatives that were over nine feet long. They appear to have been unusual crocodilians, leaving imprints only from their hind feet, suggesting the animals were bipedal.

“[The imprints] really do look like they were made by big crocodilians,” says ichnologist Anthony Martin, of Atlanta’s Emory University, who was not involved in the new study. “Indeed, by ones that were walking on their rear feet and on land. That’s pretty weird. But then again, the Cretaceous was a weird and wondrous time.”

It was a croc unlike anything alive today. In addition to walking on two legs, it left a very narrow trackway, “putting one foot in front of another,” unlike modern crocodilians, Lockley says.

The idea of a bipedal crocodilian might seem bizarre, but it is not entirely unheard of. A few previous studies have proposed that early crocodylimorphs living in North America during the Triassic may have been bipedal as well. 

The researchers therefore suggest this latest bipedal croc is a new “ichnospecies”—based solely on tracks—that they’ve named Batrachopus grandis.

A possible alternative explanation for the tracks is that the animals were floating on the surface of a lake while pushing themselves forward with their legs. But Lockley believes that if this were the case, the animals wouldn’t have left such nice, regularly spaced imprints. 

Source: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/06/fossil-footprints-crocodile-relative-walked-on-two-legs/

[xoxo Craig 55,649]

Thats like a cross between a dinosaur and a crocodile   thats so cool... but imagine that coming out of the lake you were sun bathing at on a hot summers day

[adamsenigma 9,520]

7 minutes ago, xoxo Craig said:

Thats like a cross between a dinosaur and a crocodile   thats so cool... but imagine that coming out of the lake you were sun bathing at on a hot summers day

Aren't crocodiles dinousaurs? 

[Archduchess 2]

cool

[xoxo Craig 55,649]

2 minutes ago, adamsenigma said:

Aren't crocodiles dinousaurs? 

"Crocodilians are more closely related to birds and dinosaurs than to most animals classified as reptiles, the three families being included in the group Archosauria ('ruling reptiles'). Despite their prehistoric look, crocodiles are among the more biologically complex reptiles."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crocodile

Closely related...

[GagaSine 7,464]

I love them 

[Chic 20,830]

KING K. ROOL

[Bitter Soul 431]

aw cute

[Biggest Fan 988]

This all seem cool. 
but is all works of imagination

They illustrate how it supposed to look not how it looks, and this “dinosaur” was created based on “fossils” from some “feet/paws”, basically it’s a wannabe instead of a real reptile  

These archeologist need to get their game on I’m thru their lies

[AsleepOnTheCeiling 6,953]

I was imagining a crocodile that walked like a human and was so shook until I clicked on the thread and remembered dinosaurs were a thing.