Prehistoric giant newt found
Edinburgh University palaeontologist Dr Stephen Brusatte lead the team that found skeletal remains of the newly-dubbed Metoposaurus algarvensis in the remains of a lake in the Algarve region of southern Portugal; the amphibious creature is believed to have died off when the lake dried up and the bones of hundreds are still being dug up by the researchers.
The paleontologist said what they’ve learned so far about the giant newt tells them it was “a weird animal; a big alien type of thing, like a salamander on steroids.” From piecing together bones they’ve also learned that it was not, at least to our tastes, particularity good looking.
“This new amphibian looks like something out of a bad monster movie,” Dr. Brusatte said. “It was as long as a small car and had hundreds of sharp teeth in its big flat head, which kind of looks like a toilet seat.
“It was the type of fierce predator that the very first dinosaurs had to put up with if they strayed too close to the water, long before the glory days of T-Rex and Brachiosaurus,” he added.
Giant Triassic predators
Fossilized remains of large amphibians in the same group of creature as the Metoposaurus algarvensis have been discovered elsewhere, with remains of similar species found in Africa, other areas of Europe, in India and North America.
A paper on the discovery of the creatures was published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. Written by Dr. Richard Butler of the University of Birmingham, it highlights the fact that these were not your garden-variety prehistoric newts.
“Most modern amphibians are pretty tiny and harmless,” Dr. Butler wrote. “But back in the Triassic these giant predators would have made lakes and rivers pretty scary places to be.”
