maybe some fossils are better left
buried
welcome to watchmojo.com and today we’re
counting down our picks for the top 10
strangest prehistoric creatures for this
list we’re looking at animals that live
and startled millions of years ago these
ancient monsters are ranked by how
strange they look whether they’re
disturbing terrifying or downright goofy
also they must be prehistoric and
extinct because these animals do not
have simple names their genus which is
the taxonomic rank that contains all
similar species will be used instead of
their long latin equivalents number 10
in size of oh soros
dinosaurs are supposed to be large and
menacing but the incisive Oh Soros
apparently did not get the memo
meandering the earth over 125 million
years ago in size of Oh Soros is named
for its most prominent feature large
protruding incisors that resemble
rodent-like teeth from this adaptation
scientists deduced that in size of Oh
Soros was an herbivore yep the buck
toothed dinosaur as people have
mockingly deemed it used its modified
beak to gnaw and break seeds and grains
the same way rodents do in contrast with
its Raptor cousins vegetarianism is
quite unusual and we can only assume
that this three-foot feathered buck
tooth vegan was the laughingstock of the
Cretaceous period number nine on nomal
Oh Karis a Cambrian period of
approximately 500 million years ago was
teeming with strange creatures which you
could call life’s first experiments with
complex organisms as prototypes usually
are the pre arthropod ik and Noma low
Karras was weird like Pokemon weird sort
of resembling a squid from another
planet though its name means abnormal
shrimp anomalocaris had two long
protrusions from its face each of which
was armed with spikes and two giant eyes
that were disproportionate with the rest
of its body equally disconcerting was
its cousin opa binya which had five eyes
and an elongated appendage that could be
compared to an elephant like trunk opa
binya was so strange in fact that the
first scientific presentation of its
appearance was met with laughs as you
can see life’s rough drafts were not
pretty
number eight longest wama longest wama
is known from one full fossil discovered
in kyrgyzstan the rock impression shows
a small reptile with inexplicably large
protrusions or long scales from its back
the protrusions warf the body of the
ancestral reptile and are shaped kind of
like hockey sticks a feature that left
scientists confounded about their form
and functions it’s been hypothesized
that the structures were attached with a
membrane to allow for gliding but this
is a dubious notion more accepted in the
scientific community is that the
appendages were unconnected and
performed like peacock feathers a
display adapted for defense and mating
number seven platy bellowed on many of
our prehistoric animals have physical
similarities with creatures still living
and roaming the earth today
for example bloody bellowed on resembled
a modern elephant with one notable
exception a lower jaw that looked like a
shovel head go suck air through a reed
this bizarro elephant lived between five
and fifteen million years ago and used
the scooped jaw to troll the bottom of
swamps for feeding material even the
bottom teeth were flattened for
precision digging along with the
distorted mouth lady Bella Don had to
side tusks that were used to cut trees
and vegetation making a cranial Swiss
Army knife of sorts laddie Bella dawn
was surely one of the most formidable
and intimidating herbivores to have ever
lived
number six Europe to rid Europe to rid
was a very early ancestor of spiders and
scorpions and looked like a roided
version of both they lived from 470
million years ago to about 250 million
years ago Europe jared is considered the
world’s first truly large predator as it
could attain lengths of 8 feet aside
from being larger than a man Europe
Jared had two claws four eyes eight legs
and a spiked tail completing a sadistic
amalgam of horrifying features it was an
aquatic organism but the amphibious legs
indicate it might have eventually moved
to land making Europe der it a threat
from every possible angle
number five there is in asaurus
therizinosaurus looked like a dinosaur
assembled with random body parts and
that’s exactly how science viewed it
long neck huge belly immense claws and
little feet it’s true appearance eluded
scientists for decades there is a no
soros was originally believed to be a
prehistoric turtle based in part on the
discovery of its giant arms the claws of
which are the longest in creation other
fossils refuted this claim and it was
placed in multiple dinosaur categories
before it was given its own for lack of
a better option some fossils of
dinosaurs of related genus also
contained feathers proving there’s no
limit to its bizarreness it’s eating
gravel to help with digestion much via
charism asaurus number four helicoprion
when an abundance of spiral fossils were
uncovered around the world scientists
thought they were the imprints of
ammonites shells further research
revealed a much stranger conclusion that
the fossils displayed the mouth of a
deadly fish this animal is meant to eat
meat
these tooth walls adorned the shark like
helicoprion as a serrated jaw used for
snagging prey initial sketches have the
mouth whirls unraveled leaving one of
the most unique depictions of a
prehistoric creature ever rendered it’s
now thought that the spiral jaw faced
inward and the rotating teeth acted as a
circular saw for grinding up food though
this still remains a topic of debate
helicoprion jaw is among the strangest
biological designs discovered at least
comparable with Steph acanthus –is
anvil-shaped dorsal fin number 3
pterodaustro
pterodaustro was a medium-sized
pterosaur that lived 105 million years
ago its signature adaptation was
filter-feeding teeth which made it
perfect for water though practical its
mouth looked alien as it consisted of
thousands of bristle like teeth jetting
out of a disturbingly thin beak like the
baleen of a whale these teeth helped
pterodaustro filter water for prey
sucking up small organisms and spitting
out the rest also strange is that the
bristles faced upwards and stuck outside
of the mouth even when closed
a highly intimidating feature for a
rather unintimidating dinosaur whoa
thirsty much number two
Microraptor Michael after Michael after
I grow rap because of their evolutionary
link with birds many dinosaurs had
feathers and this is a notion that is
now accepted in society
however just years ago the feathered
dinosaur image was unthinkable it was
the discovery of Microraptor that helped
launch this freaky idea
Microraptor was a small four winged
dinosaur that lived during the
Cretaceous period and fossil evidence
shows long feathers covering the flying
creature another dinosaur that helped
confirm this idea was Archaeopteryx
thanks to a single fossilized feather
the discovery of which turned
paleontology upside down it was a major
breakthrough in evolutionary study and
changed the feathered dinosaur from
weird hypothesis to even weirder reality
before we unveil our number one pick
here are some honorable mentions
full of looks like a tweak we have loads
of sticks coming out of it all the way
along Tani’s Tropius great longneck
great love tell there’s hardly anybody
at all number one
Quetzalcoatl us imagine a pelican
wearing a helmet okay now imagine that
Pelican as tall as a giraffe and with a
wingspan of a Greyhound bus that gives
you an idea of Quetzalcoatl us this
pterosaur lived about 70 million years
ago and ruled the sky the land or
anywhere it pleased
Quetzalcoatl us is one of the largest
flying reptiles ever discovered and
could have feasted on prey bigger than
humans complete with giant eye sockets a
cranial crest an 8-foot needle sharp
beak and limbs as well equipped for
running as they were for flying this
dinosaur was a mash-up of the most
terrifying aspects of prehistoric life
and could unsettle with the best of them
do you agree with our list what’s your
favorite strange prehistoric creature
for more diverse top 10s published every
day be sure to subscribe to
watchmojo.com
you
buried
welcome to watchmojo.com and today we’re
counting down our picks for the top 10
strangest prehistoric creatures for this
list we’re looking at animals that live
and startled millions of years ago these
ancient monsters are ranked by how
strange they look whether they’re
disturbing terrifying or downright goofy
also they must be prehistoric and
extinct because these animals do not
have simple names their genus which is
the taxonomic rank that contains all
similar species will be used instead of
their long latin equivalents number 10
in size of oh soros
dinosaurs are supposed to be large and
menacing but the incisive Oh Soros
apparently did not get the memo
meandering the earth over 125 million
years ago in size of Oh Soros is named
for its most prominent feature large
protruding incisors that resemble
rodent-like teeth from this adaptation
scientists deduced that in size of Oh
Soros was an herbivore yep the buck
toothed dinosaur as people have
mockingly deemed it used its modified
beak to gnaw and break seeds and grains
the same way rodents do in contrast with
its Raptor cousins vegetarianism is
quite unusual and we can only assume
that this three-foot feathered buck
tooth vegan was the laughingstock of the
Cretaceous period number nine on nomal
Oh Karis a Cambrian period of
approximately 500 million years ago was
teeming with strange creatures which you
could call life’s first experiments with
complex organisms as prototypes usually
are the pre arthropod ik and Noma low
Karras was weird like Pokemon weird sort
of resembling a squid from another
planet though its name means abnormal
shrimp anomalocaris had two long
protrusions from its face each of which
was armed with spikes and two giant eyes
that were disproportionate with the rest
of its body equally disconcerting was
its cousin opa binya which had five eyes
and an elongated appendage that could be
compared to an elephant like trunk opa
binya was so strange in fact that the
first scientific presentation of its
appearance was met with laughs as you
can see life’s rough drafts were not
pretty
number eight longest wama longest wama
is known from one full fossil discovered
in kyrgyzstan the rock impression shows
a small reptile with inexplicably large
protrusions or long scales from its back
the protrusions warf the body of the
ancestral reptile and are shaped kind of
like hockey sticks a feature that left
scientists confounded about their form
and functions it’s been hypothesized
that the structures were attached with a
membrane to allow for gliding but this
is a dubious notion more accepted in the
scientific community is that the
appendages were unconnected and
performed like peacock feathers a
display adapted for defense and mating
number seven platy bellowed on many of
our prehistoric animals have physical
similarities with creatures still living
and roaming the earth today
for example bloody bellowed on resembled
a modern elephant with one notable
exception a lower jaw that looked like a
shovel head go suck air through a reed
this bizarro elephant lived between five
and fifteen million years ago and used
the scooped jaw to troll the bottom of
swamps for feeding material even the
bottom teeth were flattened for
precision digging along with the
distorted mouth lady Bella Don had to
side tusks that were used to cut trees
and vegetation making a cranial Swiss
Army knife of sorts laddie Bella dawn
was surely one of the most formidable
and intimidating herbivores to have ever
lived
number six Europe to rid Europe to rid
was a very early ancestor of spiders and
scorpions and looked like a roided
version of both they lived from 470
million years ago to about 250 million
years ago Europe jared is considered the
world’s first truly large predator as it
could attain lengths of 8 feet aside
from being larger than a man Europe
Jared had two claws four eyes eight legs
and a spiked tail completing a sadistic
amalgam of horrifying features it was an
aquatic organism but the amphibious legs
indicate it might have eventually moved
to land making Europe der it a threat
from every possible angle
number five there is in asaurus
therizinosaurus looked like a dinosaur
assembled with random body parts and
that’s exactly how science viewed it
long neck huge belly immense claws and
little feet it’s true appearance eluded
scientists for decades there is a no
soros was originally believed to be a
prehistoric turtle based in part on the
discovery of its giant arms the claws of
which are the longest in creation other
fossils refuted this claim and it was
placed in multiple dinosaur categories
before it was given its own for lack of
a better option some fossils of
dinosaurs of related genus also
contained feathers proving there’s no
limit to its bizarreness it’s eating
gravel to help with digestion much via
charism asaurus number four helicoprion
when an abundance of spiral fossils were
uncovered around the world scientists
thought they were the imprints of
ammonites shells further research
revealed a much stranger conclusion that
the fossils displayed the mouth of a
deadly fish this animal is meant to eat
meat
these tooth walls adorned the shark like
helicoprion as a serrated jaw used for
snagging prey initial sketches have the
mouth whirls unraveled leaving one of
the most unique depictions of a
prehistoric creature ever rendered it’s
now thought that the spiral jaw faced
inward and the rotating teeth acted as a
circular saw for grinding up food though
this still remains a topic of debate
helicoprion jaw is among the strangest
biological designs discovered at least
comparable with Steph acanthus –is
anvil-shaped dorsal fin number 3
pterodaustro
pterodaustro was a medium-sized
pterosaur that lived 105 million years
ago its signature adaptation was
filter-feeding teeth which made it
perfect for water though practical its
mouth looked alien as it consisted of
thousands of bristle like teeth jetting
out of a disturbingly thin beak like the
baleen of a whale these teeth helped
pterodaustro filter water for prey
sucking up small organisms and spitting
out the rest also strange is that the
bristles faced upwards and stuck outside
of the mouth even when closed
a highly intimidating feature for a
rather unintimidating dinosaur whoa
thirsty much number two
Microraptor Michael after Michael after
I grow rap because of their evolutionary
link with birds many dinosaurs had
feathers and this is a notion that is
now accepted in society
however just years ago the feathered
dinosaur image was unthinkable it was
the discovery of Microraptor that helped
launch this freaky idea
Microraptor was a small four winged
dinosaur that lived during the
Cretaceous period and fossil evidence
shows long feathers covering the flying
creature another dinosaur that helped
confirm this idea was Archaeopteryx
thanks to a single fossilized feather
the discovery of which turned
paleontology upside down it was a major
breakthrough in evolutionary study and
changed the feathered dinosaur from
weird hypothesis to even weirder reality
before we unveil our number one pick
here are some honorable mentions
full of looks like a tweak we have loads
of sticks coming out of it all the way
along Tani’s Tropius great longneck
great love tell there’s hardly anybody
at all number one
Quetzalcoatl us imagine a pelican
wearing a helmet okay now imagine that
Pelican as tall as a giraffe and with a
wingspan of a Greyhound bus that gives
you an idea of Quetzalcoatl us this
pterosaur lived about 70 million years
ago and ruled the sky the land or
anywhere it pleased
Quetzalcoatl us is one of the largest
flying reptiles ever discovered and
could have feasted on prey bigger than
humans complete with giant eye sockets a
cranial crest an 8-foot needle sharp
beak and limbs as well equipped for
running as they were for flying this
dinosaur was a mash-up of the most
terrifying aspects of prehistoric life
and could unsettle with the best of them
do you agree with our list what’s your
favorite strange prehistoric creature
for more diverse top 10s published every
day be sure to subscribe to
watchmojo.com
you
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