Shamosuchus

Shamosuchus is an extinct genus of neosuchian crocodyliform that lived during the Late Cretaceous (Campanian) period in what is now the Djadokhta Formation of Mongolia, approximately 75 million to 71 million years ago.

Not to be confused with Shamosaurus.

Shamosuchus
Temporal range: Late Cretaceous,
Holotype specimen
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Clade: Pseudosuchia
Clade: Crocodylomorpha
Clade: Neosuchia
Family: †Paralligatoridae
Genus: †Shamosuchus
Mook, 1924
Type species
†Shamosuchus djadochtaensis
Mook, 1924

Paleobiology
Skull and diagram of referred specimen

The eye and nasal openings were not raised above the skull as in modern crocodilians, so that the animal would have to raise its head completely out of the water to breathe. As this cranial morphology does not suit an ambush predator, it lends support to the idea of a diet of aquatic invertebrates. The teeth were adapted to crush bivalves, gastropods and other animals with a shell or exoskeleton. The genus was named in 1924 by Charles C. Mook.[2]

Paralligator was synonymized with Shamosuchus by several authors.[3][4][5] However, recent cladistic analysis of Paralligatoridae found Paralligator distinct from Shamosuchus.[6]

References
  1. Rio, Jonathan P.; Mannion, Philip D. (6 September 2021). "Phylogenetic analysis of a new morphological dataset elucidates the evolutionary history of Crocodylia and resolves the long-standing gharial problem". PeerJ. 9: e12094. doi:10.7717/peerj.12094. PMC 8428266. PMID 34567843.
  2. Mook, C. C. (1924). "A new crocodilian from Mongolia" (PDF). American Museum Novitates (117): 1–5.
  3. Efimov, M. B. (1983). "Review of fossil crocodiles of Mongolia". Transactions of the Joint Soviet–Mongolia Paleontological Expedition. 24: 76–95.
  4. Rozhdestvenskiy, A. K. (1974). "History of the dinosaur fauna of Asia and other continents and questions concerning paleogeography". Transactions of the Joint Soviet–Mongolia Paleontological Expedition. 1: 107–131.
  5. Storrs, G. W.; Efimov, M. B. (2000). "Mesozoic crocodyliforms of north-central Eurasia". In Michael J. Benton; Mikhail A. Shishkin; David M. Unwin; Evgenii N. Kurochkin (eds.). The Age of Dinosaurs in Russia and Mongolia. Cambridge University Press. pp. 402–419.
  6. Turner, A. H. (2015). "A Review of Shamosuchus and Paralligator (Crocodyliformes, Neosuchia) from the Cretaceous of Asia". PLOS ONE. 10 (2): e0118116. Bibcode:2015PLoSO..1018116T. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0118116. PMC 4340866. PMID 25714338.
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