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Article: Not-so-fearsome fossils. (journal extracts).(reptilian carnivore ecology)(Brief Article)
- Article from:
- Ecos
- Article date:
- July 1, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2002 CSIRO Publishing. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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BY THE 1990s, many palaeontologists held the view that reptiles had dominated the large, land, carnivorous fauna of Australia millions of years ago, in the mid-Tertiary to Pleistocene period. But did fearsome reptiles really dominate the southern continent and prey on the gigantic, now extinct, plant eaters of the time? One hundred years earlier, scientists thought that `large and powerful' marsupial predators, such as the marsupial lion, were the scourge of herbivorous, four-legged mammals of the Pleistocene, much as in Africa or Asia today.
Dr Steve Wroe, of the University of Sydney and the Australian Museum, has reviewed the science behind this reversal of ...