Australian 'Bag of bones' fossil shows 3-level Cretaceous food chain
Fossil hunters in Australia uncovered a wild fossil in 2019 that tells the story of a real-life ancient food chain.
Picture this: a flying reptile (pterosaur) gets eaten by a big marine hunter (ichthyosaur), and then that ichthyosaur gets attacked by an even bigger beast.
This "Bag Of Bones" find is one of the clearest examples of such a three-level predator drama from the Cretaceous period, and it's giving researchers major clues about how ancient sea creatures interacted.
Bite marks show Kronosaurus attacked ichthyosaur
The fossil was found near Richmond back in 2019 and pieced together at Kronosaurus Korner Museum.
CT scans showed the ichthyosaur had snacked on the pterosaur, but bite marks and missing ribs revealed it was later attacked by Kronosaurus queenslandicus, a massive pliosaur.
UK paleontologist Dean Lomax called it "one of the clearest examples" of an ancient food chain ever found, and study co-author Matt White said, "This discovery enriches our understanding of these ancient marine reptiles and illustrates the complex interactions that shaped their prehistoric aquatic environment."