#andrewsarchus

Amazing woman design made in collab with @rayetherna!

Result from the Irdin Manha Formation #paleostream. While you might never heard it's name you most likely have heard of some of the fauna from here. First and foremost Andrewsarchus. The fossils were so far largely excavated by the @amnhnyc in northern China (Inner Mongolia) during...

...the early 20th century. That means finding ANY good information on the environment is rather... complicated. So take the interpretation here with some grain of salt. Irdin Manha is a place preserving (probably) the remains of an open, semiarid steppe with rivers...

depositing sediments with fossils of brontothers, dinoceratans and whippomorphs galore. What we witness here is a transition from the typical Eocene forest faunas to the megafauna dominated open ecosystems. The animals in this scene are clumping up around the banks of a river...

Andrewsarchus mongoliensis

illustrations by Roman Uchytel, Mick Ellison

ANDREWSARCHUS

This Giant Carnivore Ran on Hooves. Scientists Are Investigating Its Massive Skull and Crushing Teeth to Decipher the Beast’s True Nature

For more than a century, paleontologists have been piecing together how the mysterious predator Andrewsarchus is related to other mammals, like the extinct “hell pigs” and “wolves with hooves”

The beast’s head was huge. From the back to the front, its fossil skull measures more than 2.7 feet and preserves an impressive armament of piercing and crushing teeth. But what was this creature, really? Paleontologists know it as Andrewsarchus mongoliensis, and after decades of mystery, they’re still working to piece together its true nature. The animal’s impressive skull is displayed at New York City’s American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and was found more than a century ago by Kan Chuen-pao, who was employed by the museum for a 1923 paleontology expedition to Inner Mongolia, in China. He uncovered the fossil in rocks that formed between 37 million and 47 million years ago, before modern carnivores like dogs, cats and bears began to flourish. An accurate estimate of the creature’s size was impossible given the limited material, but if it had similar proportions to other carnivorous mammals of the time, the beast was clearly a giant.  Andrewsarchus was immediately hailed as “the largest terrestrial carnivore which has thus far been discovered in any part of the world.” From the beginning, the massive skull has been key to pinning down the mammal’s identity. Andrewsarchus is, to this day, known principally from this holotype, or the first fossil to bear its name. “The museum’s holotype skull of Andrewsarchus mongoliensis is still the best material for this genus and species,” says AMNH paleontologist John Flynn. The skull is “large, complete and well-preserved,” he adds, “a spectacular fossil!” But it leaves many questions unanswered. The scientific consensus on what sort of carnivorous mammal Andrewsarchus  was has shifted several times, with each new version altering what paleontologists expect were the mammal’s anatomy and habits...

A PIG? A WOLF? A WHALE???

Read more: Smithsonian Magazine

Piglike entelodonts were proposed as possible relatives of Andrewsarchus early on. 

Heinrich Harder (1858-1935) via Wikimedia Commons under public domain

Wolfish mesonychids were also thought to be relatives of Andrewsarchus. 

The Sheep in Wolf’s Clothing

a lone Andrewsarchus mongoliensis finds itself wandering the fields and searching for easy prey, only to face down a bewildered but protective livestock guardian dog.

been a while since i posted one of these; i’m back! hopefully for good this time lol; my brain told me to do side quests first.

(also, the image i used for the background was taken by Casper van Battum on Unsplash!)

Paleogene critters!

65 to 23 million years ago, when the mammals took over the globe!

Andrewsarchus - Indohyus - Entelodont / Hell Pig

Ambulocetus - Hyracodon - Basilosaurus

Hyaenodon - Uintatherium - Gastornis

Moeritherium - Titanoboa - Eohippus

Proailurus - Megacerops

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