Meet Koolasuchus cleelandi, a giant amphibian from the Cretaceous of Victoria, Australia (~125 million years ago) with the body of a salamander and a head as big as a wheelie bin lid. An animal that by all rights, SHOULD have gone extinct millions of years ago and chosen by the people as the state fossil emblem for Victoria.
We hear from two of the brilliant paleontologists who worked on the holotype, fossil preparator Lesley Kool and prospector Mike cleeland.
We deviate and also talk red and white blood-cell like structures in the Jurassic ichthyosaur Stenopterygius.
Links:
Random Fossil Fact
Palaeobiology of red and white blood cell-like structures, collagen and cholesterol in an ichthyosaur bone
Koolasuchus
The last last labyrinthodonts?
Palaeobiogeography of Australian fossil amphibians
Victoria's new state fossil emblem: Koolasuchus cleelandi
Koolasuchus cleelandi: Cool Cretaceous monster amphibian
Meet Koolasuchus cleelandi, the people's choice as Victoria's official fossil emblem
Dinosaurs of Darkness: In Search of the Lost Polar World – by Thomas H. Rich & Patricia Vickers-Rich
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