Leidyosuchus
Name:
Leidyosuchus
(Leidy’s crocodile).
Phonetic: Lay-de-soo-kus.
Named By: Lawrence M. Lambe - 1907.
Classification: Chordata, Sauropsida,
Crocodylomorpha, Crocodylia, Alligatoroidea.
Species: L. canadensis (type).
Diet: Carnivore.
Size: Skull about 40 centimetres long.
Known locations: Canada, Alberta - Dinosaur
Park Formation.
Time period: Campanian of the Cretaceous.
Fossil representation: Skull.
Leidyosuchus
is an often mentioned genus of alligator
that is known to have lived in
Canada during the late Cretaceous. With a skull about forty
centimetres long, Leidyosuchus would be expected
to have been a
mid-sized alligator and predator of small mammals and quite possibly
small dinosaurs too.
There
were once many species of Leidyosuchus, but a
1997 review of the
genus by Chris Brochu led to many of these species being discovered to
actually represent a different genus as that represented by the type
species. This led to the creation of the Borealosuchus
genus the same
year, and at the time of writing that genus now contains four former
Leidyosuchus species renamed as species of Borealosuchus.
Further reading
- On a new crocodilian genus and species from the Judith River
Formation of Alberta - Transactions of the Royal Society of
Canada, series 3 1 (4): 219–235. - Lawrence M.
Lambe - 1907.
- A review of "Leidyosuchus"
(Crocodyliformes, Eusuchia) from
the Cretaceous through Eocene of North America - Journal of
Vertebrate Paleontology 17 (4): 679–697 - C. A.
Brochu - 2005.
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