Trinacromerum
| Trinacromerum Temporal range: Late Cretaceous | |
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| A specimen of Trinacromerum at the Royal Ontario Museum | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Superorder: | †Sauropterygia |
| Order: | †Plesiosauria |
| Family: | †Polycotylidae |
| Genus: | †Trinacromerum Cragin, 1888 |
| Species: | †T. bentonianum |
| Binomial name | |
| Trinacromerum bentonianum Cragin, 1888 | |
Trinacromerum is an extinct genus of sauropterygian reptile, a member of the polycotylid plesiosaurs. It contains a single species, T. bentonianum. Specimens that lived during the Late Cretaceous period have been discovered in what is now modern Kansas and Manitoba.[1]
Description
Trinacromerum with a human to scale.
Trinacromerum was 3 meters (9.8 feet) long. Its teeth show that it fed on small fish.[1]
The long flippers of Trinacromerum enabled it to achieve high swimming speeds.[1] Its physical appearance was described by Richard Ellis as akin to a "four-flippered penguin."[2]
Classification
Profile view of Trinacromerum
Trinacromerum bentonianum from the Late Cretaceous of Kansas
Below is a cladogram of polycotylid relationships from Ketchum & Benson, 2011.[3]
| Plesiosauroidea |
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See also
References
- 1 2 3 Ellis, Richard (2003). Sea Dragons: Predators of the Prehistoric Oceans. University Press of Kansas. p. 189. ISBN 0-7006-1269-6.
- ↑ Ellis, 190
- ↑ Hilary F. Ketchum and Roger B. J. Benson (2011). "A new pliosaurid (Sauropterygia, Plesiosauria) from the Oxford Clay Formation (Middle Jurassic, Callovian) of England: evidence for a gracile, longirostrine grade of Early-Middle Jurassic pliosaurids". Special Papers in Palaeontology. 86: 109–129. doi:10.1111/j.1475-4983.2011.01083.x.
External links
PaleoDB Entry on Manitoba discovery
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Wikispecies has information related to: Trinacromerum |
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