Chaohusaurus
Name:
Chaohusaurus
(Chao Hu lizard).
Phonetic: Chow-hu-sor-us.
Named By: C. C. Young & Z. Dong -
1972.
Classification: Chordata, Reptilia,
Ichthyosauromorpha, Ichthyosauriformes, Grippidia, Grippiidae
Species: C. geishanensis
(type), C. brevifemoralis, C. zhangjiawanensis.
Diet: Piscivore.
Size: Adults up to about 180 centimetres long.
Known locations: China - Jialingjang Formation,
Majianshan Limestone Formation
Time period: Olenekian to Anisian of the Triassic.
Fossil representation: Remains of several
individuals.
Chaohusaurus
is a genus of ichthyosauromorph marine reptile that lived in sea waters
around Asia during the early/mid Triassic. Chaohusaurus
had a similar
body plan to other primitive ichthyosaurs
being more lizard-like than
fish-like as seen in later ichthyosaurs. Still, the limbs of
Chaohusaurus were adapted to form paddles, and the
rear half of the
tail dipped down slightly to form a paddle that was the primary form of
forward locomotion.
At
least one known specimen of Chaohusaurus shows
embryos of young
developing inside the body of an adult, confirming that Chaohusaurus
was viviparous and did not have to return to the land to lay eggs.
Therefore it is likely that Chaohusaurus spent
their entire lives in
the sea, hunting for small aquatic organisms such as fish and squid.
Further reading
- [On the Triassic aquatic reptiles of China]. - Memoirs of the
Nanjing Institute of Geology and Paleontology. 9: 1–34. - C.
C. Young & Z. Dong - 1972.
- Observations on Triassic ichthyosaurs. Part VII. New data on
the osteology of Chaohusaurus geishanensis YOUNG & DONG,
1972 from the Lower Triassic of Anhui (China). - Neues
Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlungen. 219:
305–327. - M. W. Maisch - 2001.
- A new Triassic primitive ichthyosaur from Yuanan, South China.
- Acta Geologica Sinica 87(3):672-677. - X. Chen, P.
M. Sander, L. Cheng & X. Wang - 2013.
- The new ichthyosauriform Chaohusaurus brevifemoralis (Reptilia,
Ichthyosauromorpha) from Majiashan, Chaohu, Anhui Province,
China. - PeerJ 7(e7561). - J. Huang, R. Motani,
D. Jiang, A. Tintori, O. Rieppel, M. Zhou, X. Ren
& R. Zhang - 2019.
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