How on earth do fundamentalists who believe the world is only 6000 years old explain away something so bristling with predator teeth?SAO PAULO, Brazil (AP) -- The 80 million-year-old remains of a land-bound reptile described as a possible link between prehistoric and modern-day crocodiles were displayed to the public for the first time on Thursday.
The fossil of the 5 1/2-foot-long predator was found in 2004 near the small city of Monte Alto, 215 miles northwest of Sao Paulo, paleontologist Felipe Mesquita de Vasconcellos said by telephone, after presenting the find to a news conference at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
The long-limbed and extremely agile animal, dubbed "Montealtosuchus arrudacamposi," roamed arid and hot terrain that is now Brazilian countryside, Vasconcelos said.
"As a missing link to prehistoric crocodiles, it offers us an excellent opportunity to study the evolutionary transition of these animals," Vasconcellos said. "It has a mix of morphological traits common in prehistoric crocodiles and in the ones that exist today."
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