Livyatan

 

Name: Livyatan/Leviathan

Habitat: Shores of South America

Historical Time: Middle Miocene (13-12 million years ago)

Size and Weight: About 50 feet long and 25-50 tons

Diet: Large marine creatures

Fact:  Recently, the name of this prehistoric whale was changed to the Hebrew Livyatan, since it turned out that "Leviathan" had already been used for a species of Mastodon.

Bullockornis

 

Name: Bullockornis ("ox bird") or The Demon Duck of Doom

Habitat: Woodlands of Australia

Historical Time: Middle Miocene (15 million years ago)

Size and Weight: About 8 feet tall and 500 pounds

Diet: Meat

Fact:  Bullockornis seems to have been more closely related to ducks and geese than to modern ostriches, and its heavy, prominent beak points to its having had a carnivorous diet.

Basilosaurus

 

Name: Basilosaurus ("king lizard")

Habitat: Oceans of North America, Africa and southern Asia

Historical Time: Middle Eocene (40-35 million years ago)

Size and Weight: Up to 60 feet long and 50-75 tons

Diet: Fish and squids

Fact: Probably the biggest prehistoric whale that ever lived, Basilosaurus was incorrectly identified as a marine reptile--hence its name, Greek for "king lizard" when the bones were first discovered in 1843 of this prehistoric whale, scientists then tried to amend their mistake by calling it Zeuglodo

Spinosaurus

Name: Spinosaurus ("spine lizard")

Habitat: Swamps of North Africa

Historical Time: Middle Cretaceous (95 million years ago)

Size and Weight: About 50 feet long and 7 tons

Diet: Meat and fish

Fact: The original fossils of Spinosaurus were destroyed in World War II.

Utahraptor

 

Name: Utahraptor ("Utah thief")

Habitat: Plains of North America

Historical Time: Early Cretaceous (130-120 million years ago)

Size and Weight: About 23 feet long and 1,000-1,500 pounds

Diet: Meat

Fact: Utahraptor is the largest raptor so far discovered, possessing especially dangerous-looking, nine-inch-long claws, and possibly covered in feathers

Archaeopteryx

 Name: Archaeopteryx ("ancient wing")

Habitat: Forests and lakes of Western Europe

Historical Time: Late Jurassic (150 million years ago)

Size and Weight: About 12 inches long and 1 pound

Diet: Insects

Fact:  The feathers of Archaeopteryx were unsuited to powered flight meaning that Archaeopteryx may have lived in trees.

Titanis

Name: Titanis ("titanic")

Habitat: Plains of North America

Historical Time: Early Pliocene-Early Pleistocene (5-2 million years ago)

Size and Weight: About 8 feet tall and 300 pounds

Diet: Meat

Fact:  Titanis closely resembled its theropod(raptor) dinosaur forebears, especially its puny arms with long-taloned, grasping hands