Thursday, April 23, 2009
A web of intrigue in the Arctic
RESEARCHERS working in the far north of Canada have recovered the fossil remains of a unique seal-like creature that has paws rather than flippers. They believe it may be a “missing link” that fills in a huge gap in the family tree for seals and related animals, writes DICK AHLSTROM
Modern seals are ungainly on land, staggering along on short flippers not best designed for terrestrial use. Once in the water, however, seals and their cousins, sea lions and walruses, become graceful swimmers.
Scientists are excited about the find, made in a crater lake on Devon Island in Nunavut, Canada. Located well inside the Arctic Circle, due north of the Great Lakes, the near-complete skeleton dates back between 21 and and 24 million years. Devon Island today is under ice most of the time but back then it was a temperate haven, with a coastal climate much like Ireland’s today and covered with conifer forests.
The animal, Puijila darwini, measured about 110cm from head to the tip of its longish tail, and although it had a body and muzzle akin to a seal’s, it had legs like an otter with webbed paws that were ideal for swimming. This meant it was swift of foot on land but also in the water, according to the research team from the Canadian Museum of Nature, the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh and the American Museum of Natural History, who describe their findings this morning in in the journal Nature.
More:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sciencetoday/2009/0423/1224245199536.html
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