The Prehistoric Park Animal Field Guide Volume 1

by WildExpert24

As a Prehistoric Park employee, you get the privilege to work with the likes of previously extinct animals. However, if you want to survive longer than five minutes, then you need to have knowledge of its inhabitants. From the world of Cartoon's Prehistoric Park, this Guide will give you info on behavior, diet, lifespan, and more. Welcome to the Ultimate Prehistoric Guidebook.

31. Thoracosaurus

Thoracosaurus

Scientific Classification

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Reptilia

Order: Crocodilia

Superfamily: Gavialoidea

Genus: Thoracosaurus

Type Species: Thoracosaurus neocesariensis meaning "Crested Saurian."

Described by Joseph Mellick Leidy, 1852 (Generic Name).

Species:

-Thoracosaurus neocesariensis (de Kay, 1842 [originally Gavialis neocesariensis]) (type)

-Thoracosaurus isorhynchus (Pomel, 1847)

-Thoracosaurus macrorhynchus (de Blainville, 1855)

Current Park Population: (19; all adults; 9 male, 10 female)

Park Diet: Fish, thawed mice and rats, and pre-killed chicken and parts of pigs and sheep.

Natural Diet: Fish and small reptiles, amphibians, birds, mammals, young, and baby dinosaurs.

Lifespan: 50 years

Habitat: Wetlands, Swamps, rivers, streams, ponds, salt marshes, estuaries, and coastal shallow shores.

Native Ecosystem: North America, Laramadia and Appalachia, Hell Creek Formation, New Jersey, Montana, North Dakota, Georgia, and Maryland, and Europe, The Netherlands, and France. Late Cretaceous to Early Paleogene, 70.6 to 61.6 Million Years Ago, Maastrichtian Stage to the Danian Stage of the Paleocene epoch.

Breeding Season: April-July

Gestation Period: three to five weeks

Eggs Laid: 20-60 eggs

Hatching Time: four-five weeks

Danger Level: 5 out of 10.

Summary: There were many reptiles during the age of dinosaurs among them are the crocodilians and crocodylomorphs, one in particular is Thoracosaurus. Thoracosaurus was a crocodilian that can grow up to more than 20 feet in length and lived in what is now Europe and North America, swimming in both salt and freshwater like today's saltwater and American crocodile as their remains were found in both freshwater and marine deposits. It is believed to be a primitive member of the gavialoid line that includes the modern-day gharial of India.

Description:

Thoracosaurus neocesariensis

Adults are covered with reddish-brown scales crocodiles, with black stripes along the back, black spots dotting the rest of the body, and pale underbelly and long snouts with needle-sharp conical teeth, they were also covered

Hatchlings are identical to the adults but have tannish-brown scales instead.

Size: Estimated 20 feet (6 meters) long and 1 ton with some specimens reaching up to 9 meters in length.

Classification: Although Thoracosaurus has been largely considered a gavialoid, very recent studies seem to suggest that the similarities between Thoracosaurus and gavialids are just a product of convergent evolution and that Thoracosaurus may not have been a crocodilian as previously expected, being a stem-crocodilian instead, more related to the contemporaneous Borealosuchus, also believed to be a stem-crocodilian, under the same study.

Taxonomy: Thoracosaurus had traditionally been thought to be related to the modern false gharial, largely because the nasal bones contact the premaxillae. Phylogenetic work starting in the 1990s instead supported affinities within Gavialoidea exclusive of such forms, although a 2018 tip dating study simultaneously using morphological, molecular (DNA sequencing), and stratigraphic (fossil age) data suggests that it might have been a non-crocodylian eusuchian. The genus contains the type species Thoracosaurus neocesariensis in North America, and what is either Thoracosaurus isorhynchus or Thoracosaurus macrorhynchus from Europe; a recent review argues that T. macrorhynchus is a junior synonym of T. isorhynchus, but it is unclear whether the type of T. isorhynchus allows differentiation of European and North American Thoracosaurus; if not, then T. isorhynchus would be a nomen dubium. Several species have been referred to this genus, but most are dubious.

Paleobiology:

Social Behavior: Thoracosuaurus are mostly solitary and sometimes aggregate in floats to bask or breed.

Diet: Thoracosaurus preyed on fish in the waterways and any small animal or young dinosaur that came to the shore to drink or swim. It likely would have lived like a modern false gharial based on similar jaws. False gharials catch fish by waiting for them to pass by and catching them by quickly whipping their heads sideways.

Ecology: It is thought to have inhabited marine and freshwater environments. They excrete excess salt from salt glands located on the tongue. Thoracosaurus is the rarest of the Hell Creek Eusuchians and also the largest.

Interactions with other species: They are normally ignored by the large dinosaurs often getting out of their way, but could occasionally prey on small dinosaurs, Thescelosaurus, Leptoceratops, Trierarchuncus, Acheroraptor, Pectinodon, the pterosaur, Quetzalcoatlus lawsonii, and young dinosaurs from Pachycephalosaurus, Ornithomimus, Triceratops, Torosaurus, Edmontosaurus, Alamosaurus, Anzu, Ankylosaurus, and Tyrannosaurus. They occasionally prey on small animals like Dinilysia and Didelphodon.

The large adult herbivores would stomp and chase off the Crocodilian if it grabs their head by mistake. Groups of Dromaeosaurus, Pectinodon, Acheroraptor, and Quetzalcoatlus would mob the Crocodilian, and occasionally T. Rex would prey on the Crocodilian if given the chance.

Extinction: Unlike the other Mesozoic Animals, Thoracosaurus who appear in the last days of the Late Cretaceous period, survived the infamous K-Pg (Cretaceous-Paleogene) Mass Extinction event 66 million years ago, and thrived up until the Early Paleocene epoch of the Early Paleogene period around 62 million years ago. There are two main reasons. First, crocodiles can live for a very long time without food. Second, they lived in places that were the least affected when the asteroid hit Earth. Crocodiles survived the asteroid strike that wiped out the dinosaurs thanks to their 'versatile' and 'efficient' body shape, Crocodiles can thrive in or out of the water and live in complete darkness. They are also very robust, meaning they can survive terrible injuries.

Danger Tip: Like all Crocodiles, Thoracosaurus should be avoided as if they get close to the water and they are attracted to splashing they will grab you and drag you into the depths. To get out, punch it in the nostrils which it's most sensitive to and it will let go.

Significant Events: The Team encounters a float of Thoracosaurus on the third day of the First mission, in the slow-moving river alongside other crocodilians and reptiles. A group consisting of Lynn, May, Muscleman, Charlie, Jake, Finn, Skips, and Mordecai used canned fish for bait while splashing the water with sticks and getting the Thoracosaurus float and the two other crocodilian floats charging through the portal to the park. They now reside in the Hell Creek Forest Building.

Hell Creek Forest Building Crocodile Pit: It is a large pit in the very center of the building and has a bridge built over it for staff and future guests and there are glass underwater viewing windows. Within it was a large lake divided into four portions for the four rescued crocodilian floats of crocodilian. Thoracosaurus live in a paddock that transitions from a freshwater swamp to an estuary environment replicating the habitats Throacosaurus lived in

Conclusion: Thoracosaurus in Paleo Park, represents one of the first crocodilians to be brought back from the past. It also gives us an understanding of Crocodile evolution and how Thoracosaurus survived the Mass Extinction.

The Field Guide might take a long time, like structuring and writing descriptions of the creatures, but also my time in college and spending time with my family. So you can suggest additional information quotes, descriptions, and natural or speculative behaviors for the prehistoric animals that I can edit and you send your suggestions either in reviews or Private Messages.

Examples: Inferring what the toons are doodling on the sketches or snarking quotes.

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