RENO, Nev. (KOLO) -An ichthyosaur fossil found 120 miles east of Reno in central Nevada is being described as the earth’s first giant and is shedding light on surprisingly rapid growth after a massive die-off of other ocean life.
The ichthyosaur is called Cymbospondylus youngorum – it’s not a dinosaur – was more than 55 feet long and was described in a paper published in the journal Science on Thursday.
It was found in rocks called the Fossil Hill Member in Lander County’s Augusta Mountains 41 miles northwest of Austin.
This ichthyosaur lived on earth about 246 million years ago during the Middle Triassic Era or about 3 million years after the beast migrated from land to the water. That it got that big that soon is surprising to researchers, according to a press release from the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, where the fossil is on display.
The fossil was first discovered in 1998 but its size was not understood.
“The importance of the find was not immediately apparent, because only a few vertebrae were exposed on the side of the canyon,” Martin Sander, paleontologist at the University of Bonn and research associate with the Dinosaur Institute at the museum, said in a statement. “However, the anatomy of the vertebrae suggested that the front end of the animal might still be hidden in the rocks. Then, one cold September day in 2011, the crew needed a warm-up and tested this suggestion by excavation, finding the skull, forelimbs, and chest region.”
The complete fossil, about 6.5-feet long, was removed in 2015.
Researchers believe several large marine animals could have been supported at the time of Cymbospondylus youngorum.
Another species of ichthyosaur, Shonisaurus popularis, is the official Nevada state fossil. The Cymbospondylus youngorum fossil was found about 77 miles north of the Berlin Ichthyosaur State Park, which has the largest known concentration of ichthyosaur fossils.
Cymbospondylus youngorum is named for Tom and Bonda Young of Great Basin Brewery, where the popular ICKY IPA with an ichthyosaur on the label was created. They sponsored the fieldwork for the project, the museum noted in a statement.
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