Why Did Ichthyosaurs Go Extinct?

Slower evolution and climate change drove ichthyosaurs to extinction. Ichthyosaurs – shark-like marine reptiles

from the time of dinosaurs – were driven to extinction by intense climate change and their own failure to evolve quickly enough, according to new research by an international team of scientists.

When did the ichthyosaurs go extinct?

This last ichthyosaur genus was thought to have become extinct early in the late Cretaceous, during the Cenomanian about 95 million years ago. The ichthyosaurs thus would have disappeared much earlier than other large Mesozoic reptile groups that generally survived until the end of the Cretaceous.

What killed the ichthyosaurs?

An ancient, dolphinlike reptile called an ichthyosaur may have died from overeating. A bulge in the belly of this fossilized creature (pictured) contains the remains of a reptile called a thalattosaur, which was nearly as long as the ichthyosaur itself.