Thank you extinct. 8 eerie prehistoric creatures

• Thank extinct. 8 eerie prehistoric creatures

It is believed that the ancient insects have huge size because in the Earth's atmosphere, then it was more oxygen. This is partly true. But another important reason for their gigantism - a lack of competition among vertebrates. Millions of years ago, long before the first dinosaurs, arthropods were the main predators on the planet.

Giant sea scorpion

This snake existed between 460 and 255 million years ago. Only recently, scientists were able to find him a fossilized claw, which made it possible to imagine what size actually reached this monster. It turned out that he was almost half a meter longer than previously thought. The length of this sea scorpion was about 2 meters.

meganeura

Meganervy - is a separate type of strekozopodobnyh insects that lived in the Carboniferous period, about 303-298 million years ago. To date, they are the largest insects of all that ever existed on Earth. The wingspan of the dragonflies could reach 75 cm They are predators and preying on other insects -. Diktionevrid that size were from the middle of a dove.

Giant flea

Yes, in the Jurassic period, and there were their giant fleas. they lived on the dinosaurs and pterosaurs, and they ate. And, as usual, the size was much larger than their counterparts today. One such flea Jurassic could reach 2 to 3 cm. This, of course, not as impressive as the two-meter sea scorpion. But nonetheless.

Pulmonoskorpion

On land there is also a kind of giant scorpions. In the period from 336 to 326 million years ago the Earth's giants crept up to 70 cm.

Anomalocaris

This is an arthropod - one of the largest organisms of the Cambrian period. It is believed that the length of the body Anomalocaris could reach 60 cm. At the same time he was also a very developed eyes of all the species of the period. Excellent vision it provided 16,000 hexagonal lenses in two compound eyes. For comparison, the modern fly about 4 thousand lenses in their eyes.

hallucigenia

It is a strange creature. Partly for this reason it is called, because it looks like a hallucination. Most likely it hallucigenia were the ancestors of modern tardigrades and arthropods. Similar in appearance to a worm with two rows of stilted legs and dorsal spines. They had an elongated head with simple eyes. A body length reaches only up to 3 cm.

arthropleura

It is unrealistic huge millipedes millipede. These monsters lived on Earth since the late Carboniferous to Early Permian examples used from 314 to 290 million years ago. These are the largest known terrestrial invertebrates. In arthropleura were 30 pairs of legs and a flat body length of up to 2, 6 meters. Until now, however, it remains a mystery what they ate centipedes. Scientists and can not solve this issue because none of fossils was not kept my mouth.

cameroceras

This huge clam was one of the largest animals that lived in the age of the Paleozoic. One only its shell was up to 10 meters long, that is, together with this tentacled beast was about 11 meters. In their places of habitat cameroceras was supreme predator. Swimming in deep water, he ate mostly merostomes and small cephalopods.