Fossil Footprints Reveal Ecosystem In Midst Of A Mass Extinction

Tracks show dinosaurs and mammal ancestors surviving amid devastation.

Dead Things iconDead Things
By Gemma Tarlach
Jan 29, 2020 7:00 PMApr 17, 2020 9:27 PM
Mass Extinction - Bordy et al. 2020 PLOS ONE
Artist's rendering of an ecosystem mid-mass extinction: Researchers found dozens of footprints of dinosaurs and mammal ancestors at the site in South Africa. (Credit: Bordy et al. 2020 PLOS ONE)

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When the world as you know it is ending, what do you do? Apparently, if you're a dinosaur or synapsid — the group of animals that today includes mammals — you cool your toes in a stream. In an environment torn apart by cataclysmic volcanic activity, life, you know, found a way.

Researchers working in South Africa found dozens of fossilized footprints, also called ichnofossils, that tell a surprising story of survival during the first waves of a mass extinction.

Early Jurassic Mass Extinction

You've probably heard about "The Big Five" — the five largest global mass extinctions recorded in the fossil record (many researchers believe we're in the middle of a sixth, thanks to human meddling). But our planet's past is riddled with somewhat smaller die-offs, many of which were, on a regional level, as catastrophic as the better-known events.

One such modest mass extinction occurred about 183 million years ago, during the Early Jurassic. It's technically known as the Pliensbachian-Toarcian mass extinction, or end-Pliensbachian, and unfolded over a few million years. Ocean waters warmed and their oxygen levels fell, and across much of the world, wildfires burned and toxic gasses turned the air into a smothering stew.

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