Paleontology

You wouldn't believe how extremely large some of the prehistoric relatives of everyday animals really were.

Plesiosaurs were the oddballs of the sea. They resembled a cross between a dolphin and a crocodile, balancing their tiny heads on giraffe-like necks. Despite the Frankenstein factor, these carnivorous reptiles owned the ancient oceans and left behind fascinating facts.

With the useless arms taken aside, this prehistoric beast boasts some extra features.

This article explores the life, traits, and characteristics of the dinosaur known as the Velociraptor.

For a tyrant lizard king, we are left to wonder why he had those diminutive arms.

Stegosaurus is one of the most well known and fascinating dinosaurs, but most people probably don't know much about these amazing prehistoric creatures.

The Year of the Herbivore

An interview with paleontologist Peter Dodson.

From Buriol's burglar to buried dragons, these are the most important discoveries of 2016.

A recap of the trend-bucking new dinosaurs of 2015

An interview with paleontologist and geologist Gerta Keller.

Discover 5 of the most terrifying prehistoric predators that lived in ice age North America during the time of the megafauna.

The debate is hardly over yet, but the scales-versus-feathers controversy just gets more and more interesting. Which dinosaurs certainly had feathers, and which dinosaurs might have?

Biologists were shocked when a strange prehistoric animal was found alive in 1938. The Coelacanth was presumed extinct for 65 million years.

Who would win, the Livyatan (Leviathan) Melvillei, the massive predatory whale, or the Megalodon shark? Here's a look at what might have happened when these prehistoric sea monsters clashed.

Scientists are trying to bring extinct animals back to life by a process called cloning. The result would be de-extinction. The idea is exciting but controversial.

What makes the Cretaceous sea worse than any other in history is that there isn't just one predator to worry about, but a whole collection of them, including sharks, lightning fast killer fish and fearsome giant marine reptiles called mosasaurs.

The extinction of the dinosaurs marked the end of one era, but heralded the beginning of another. It only took the Earth a few million years to recover from the after effects of the asteroid impact, but it was a changed world. This hub profiles one small corner of that world, in a time called the Eocene...

The history of life series moves on to the period where not only complex lifeforms evolved, but came to take over the world. But they didn't have everything their own way, the Paleozoic era bore witness to natural disasters that make our problems seem minute...

65 million years ago, a massive asteroid crashed into the Earth. It wiped out 70 per cent of all life, including the most successful, the dinosaurs. But what if the asteroid had missed? What would the world be like today, if the dinosaurs had survived...

Have you ever stopped and wondered why all the large and dangerous animals seem to live in Africa? Or why we seem to harbour an incurable fascination with monsters? The answers to these questions could well lie in our past, where our remote ancestors lived alongside Africa's real monsters...

Here is some specific information about the Smilodon cats in general, and further information in specifics regarding each species of known Smilodon that once was.

An overview of some different dinosaurs

Whether you're walking along the shore or the beach of one of the Great Lakes, you may pick up what looks like a fossil and want to know more about what you're holding in your hand.

The saber-toothed cat is a well-known prehistoric creature also known as the smilodon. Though most closely related to a lion, it is frequently called a saber-toothed tiger.