Discovery of a former herbivore the size of an elephant called "surprising"

BERLIN – A giant plant-eating, beak-like, reptilian-looking creature may have traveled the Earth during the Upper Triassic, more than 200 million years ago, scientists said. In an article published by Science magazine on Thursday, Polish researchers say their findings overturn the idea that dinosaurs were the only giant plant eaters of the era.

The elephant-sized creature, named Lisowicia bojani after a village in southern Poland where his remains were found, belonged to the same evolutionary branch as mammals.

Similar fossils of so-called dicynodonts have been found elsewhere, but they dated from an earlier period, before a series of natural disasters wiped out most species on Earth.

"We used to think that after the extinction of the final Permian, mammals and their loved ones would retreat into the shade as dinosaurs grew and grew," Grzegorz Niedzwiedzki said. , paleontologist of the University of Uppsala in Sweden, co-author of the paper.

The discovery of giant dicynodonts living at the same time as the sauropods – a branch of the family of dinosaurs at the origin of the iconic diplodocus – has suggested that environmental factors may have resulted in the evolution of gigantism in the end of the Triassic, said the researchers.

Christian Kammerer, dicynodontic specialist at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, did not participate in the discovery, said Lisowicia's size was "surprising".

"The great dicynodonts were known in both the Permian and the Triassic, but never on this scale," he said.

Kammerer said that while dicynodonts and dinosaurs existed at the same time, there was no evidence yet that they lived in the same habitats. He also questioned the conclusions of the study on Lisowicia's posture.

"However, on the whole, I think it's a very intriguing and important document, and shows us that there is still a lot to learn about the first relatives of Triassic mammals," he said. Kammerer.

Last year, a study proclaimed newly named species Heavyweight champion of all dinosaurs – at 76 tons, the plant-eating mastodon was as heavy as a space shuttle.