Crazyhen Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 This fossil was found in Yunnan Province, China, along with Keichousaurus. So it's Triassic. Is it a snake skeleton or the tail of a marine reptile like Xipusaurus? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troodon Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Interesting, no help here, but I don't believe snakes were around in the Triassic. Probably marine. 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digit Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Indeed. The first snakes evolved from terrestrial lizards in the Early Cretaceous around 128 Ma. Assuming the specimen in question predates that this should exclude snake as a possibility. Cool fossil. Cheers. -Ken 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oilshale Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Snake is is very unlikely, they should not occur yet. I looked at the tail of my Xinpusaurus - the vertebrae look different, but some thalattosaurs like Concavispina had extremely long tails, No real idea what it could be. 2 Be not ashamed of mistakes and thus make them crimes (Confucius, 551 BC - 479 BC). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randyw Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 Lol! It looks like a trackway to me... But I'm on my iphone so I can't blow up the pictures well. 2 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HuckMucus Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 22 minutes ago, Randyw said: Lol! It looks like a trackway to me... But I'm on my iphone so I can't blow up the pictures well. Good call. That would explain the break. Maybe it was moving forward, ran into something, backed a little and went around. Wild-eyed speculation. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mahnmut Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 I also say trackway, probably arthropod? 1 Try to learn something about everything and everything about something Thomas Henry Huxley Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TOM BUCKLEY Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 I vote for arthropod trackway. 1 AVOCATIONAL PALEONTOLOGIST STROKE SURVIVOR CANCER SURVIVOR CURMUDGEON "THERE IS A VERY FINE LINE BETWEEN AVOCATIONAL PALEONTOLOGY AND MENTAL ILLNESS" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 I agree with all of the above: Triassic marine, so snake is excluded, and at the size those vertebrae would be unlikely to feed the trail of a vertebrate. Especially considering the irregular pattern of the fossil at the top of the right-hand slab in the first photograph, I'd say an arthropod trackway would not sound unreasonable. Here are two very similar looking examples of trilobite trackways (though trilobites themselves, of course, would not have been around any more): (source) 1 'There's nothing like millions of years of really frustrating trial and error to give a species moral fibre and, in some cases, backbone' -- Terry Pratchett Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rocket Posted April 28, 2022 Share Posted April 28, 2022 cool find, yes, I would agree, trackway Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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