| Trinacromerum Temporal range: Late Cretaceous | |
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| A cast specimen of Trinacromerum kirki at the Royal Ontario Museum | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Superorder: | †Sauropterygia |
| Order: | †Plesiosauria |
| Family: | †Polycotylidae |
| Genus: | †Trinacromerum Cragin, 1888 |
| Species | |
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Trinacromerum is an extinct genus of sauropterygian reptile, a member of the polycotylid plesiosaurs. It contains two species, T. bentonianum and T. kirki. Specimens have been discovered in the Late Cretaceous fossil deposits of what is now modern Kansas and Manitoba.[1]
Description
Trinacromerum with a human to scale
Trinacromerum was 3 meters (9.8 feet) long. Its teeth show that it fed on small fish.[1]
The long flippers of Trinacromerum enabled it to achieve high swimming speeds.[1] Its physical appearance was described by Richard Ellis as akin to a "four-flippered penguin."[2] Its name means "three tipped femur".
Classification
Profile view of a cast of a Manitoban specimen of Trinacromerum kirki
Trinacromerum bentonianum from the Late Cretaceous of Kansas
Below is a cladogram of polycotylid relationships from Ketchum & Benson, 2011.[3]
| Plesiosauroidea |
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See also
References
- 1 2 3 Ellis, Richard (2003). Sea Dragons: Predators of the Prehistoric Oceans. University Press of Kansas. p. 189. ISBN 0-7006-1269-6.
- ↑ Ellis, 190
- ↑ Hilary F. Ketchum; Roger B. J. Benson (2011). "A new pliosaurid (Sauropterygia, Plesiosauria) from the Oxford Clay Formation (Middle Jurassic, Callovian) of England: evidence for a gracile, longirostrine grade of Early-Middle Jurassic pliosaurids". Special Papers in Palaeontology. 86: 109–129.
External links
Wikispecies has information related to Trinacromerum.
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