Scientists Stunned By Jurassic Beaver Discovery
Posted on March 3, 2006
New Scientist reports that scientists in China have discovered the fossil of a large beaver-like mammal that lived during the Jurassic period. This is an important discovery because previously scientists believed that only very small mouse-sized mammals lived during the Jurassic period.
The discovery of a new, remarkably preserved fossil of a beaver-like mammal that lived 164 million years ago is shaking palaeontologists’ understanding of early mammals.The article said scientists believe that the animal lived like a platypus, an egg laying marsupial animal that lives in Australia. The BBC also has an article about the ancient mammal.Looking as if it was put together from pieces of platypus, river otter, and beaver, the creature was nearly half a metre long and weighed about half a kilogram. This makes it the largest mammal ever found in the Jurassic Period, from 200 million to 145 million years ago.
The fossil of the semi-aquatic mammal Castorocauda lutrasimilis was discovered in the middle Jurassic Jiulongshan formation in Inner Mongolia, China, by Qiang Ji at Nanjing University, and colleagues. It boasts the oldest fossil fur ever found.
Palaeontologists had long thought the mammals living under the feet of the dinosaurs were tiny shrew-like animals. But recent discoveries have challenged this notion.