Scientists unearth 248 million-years-old marine reptile that shared this curious similarity to whales

You must've seen videos of certain types of whales that hunt by merely swimming with their mouths open. Their prey just seems to swim right into their cavernous mouths and into their bellies. This behaviour is called filter-feeding. Using this, species like blue whales and baleen whales sift immense quantities of tiny prey from the ocean.

While fascinating, whales are far from the first species to use this hunting method. Fossils unearthed in China's Hubei Province show that a curious marine reptile that roamed the waters around 250 million years ago had hunting habits similar to the modern gentle giants of the sea — whales.

Blast from the past

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Scientists estimate that the ancient reptile species existed in the Triassic Period, around 248 million years ago. They suggest that the marine reptile species called Hupehsuchus nanchangensis was lost to us during Earth's worst mass extinction.

While the reptile had a feeding style similar to the modern whale, Hupehsuchus was far more modest, at only about three feet (one metre) long.

Fossils indicate that the reptile had a long, narrow snout, a toothless mouth. It used its front and back limbs as paddles for steering, and its broad tail for forward propulsion.

Hupehsuchus nanchangensis' snout was made up of long, loose bones, with the lower jaw connected to the rest of the skull loosely. This, as per the scientists, allowed it to open its mouth wide to take in large amounts of water that contained small prey like zooplanktons.

How similar were these reptiles to whales?

Not very, there's a very obvious, enormous size difference. Furthermore, while the feeding method is similar, scientists speculate that there might be key differences.

"The further the relationship between two animals, the more fascinating this phenomenon becomes," said the study's lead author paleontologist Long Cheng of the Wuhan Center of China Geological Survey.
"Baleen whales are mammals and Hupehsuchus are reptiles. Their affinity is so distant. And they appeared more than 200 million years apart," he added.

To sift through the ocean water for prey, whales use baleen plates, aka whale bone, that are plates made of keratin. However, fossils of the Hupehsuchus nanchangensis were missing baleen.

Researchers say that one reason for this could be that keratin does not fossilise well. Based on grooves and notches found on the fossil's jaw, they believe that the reptile had soft tissue which must've served as baleen.

Talking to Reuters, co-author of the research, palaeontologist Mike Benton of the University of Bristol in England said: "Altogether, this points to a soft pouch made of skin around the mouth and throat, as in modern baleen whales, and some kind of filtering device hanging from the jaws, like baleen - but the 'baleen' and skin are not preserved."The research was published on Monday in the journal BMC Ecology and Evolution.

(With inputs from agencies)

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