Cretaceous plesiosaurs ate ammonites
Cretaceous plesiosaurs ate ammonites
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白垩纪的蛇颈龙吃菊石
作者：
Tamaki Sato;K. Tanabe
蛇颈龙类是大型中生代海洋爬行动物，被认为是中生代海洋中的主要掠食者，尽管只有很少（包括一些可疑的）直接证据表明它们的胃内容物。在这里，我们报告了在日本北部北海道发现的白垩纪短颈蛇颈龙的部分骨骼以及大量孤立的菊石颌骨。据我们所知，这是对多子叶蛇颈龙胃内容物的首次描述，也是蛇颈龙和菊石之间猎物-捕食者关系的第一个确凿证据。
The Plesiosauria, large Mesozoic marine reptiles, have been regarded as dominant predators in Mesozoic seas, although there is only a little (including some doubtful) direct evidence of their stomach contents,. Here we report the occurrence in Hokkaido, northern Japan, of a partial skeleton of a Cretaceous short-necked plesiosaur together with a large number of isolated ammonoid jaws. This is, to our knowledge, the first description of the stomach contents of a polycotylid plesiosaur, and the first firm evidence of prey-predator relationships between plesiosaurs and ammonites.