OREODONTS: MOUNTAIN TEETH & ANCIENT OREGON

Cast of Oreodont, John Day Formation

With a pig-like body, a sheep-ish silhouette and a distant connection to camels, an oreodont is a lovely reminder that ancient life did not always fit neatly into familiar categories. 

These curious mammals were enormously successful, leaving abundant fossils in places as far apart as South Dakota’s Badlands and Oregon’s John Day country. 

The specimen you see here is a cast of an oreodont fossil from the John Day Formation—a chance to meet one of the characters that browsed ancient Oregon long before its present landscape took shape.

Oreodonts lived in North America from roughly 40 million to 5 million years ago, spanning much of the Eocene through the Miocene. They belonged to the artiodactyls, the even-toed mammals whose living members include camels, bison and bighorn sheep. 

Oreodont Reconstruction

Many oreodonts had four hooved toes and sturdy, short-legged bodies. Camels are generally considered their closest living relatives, though the relationship is a distant one. No family reunion invitations have been forthcoming.

Their teeth reveal a plant-eating lifestyle, with cheek teeth suited to processing vegetation such as leaves and shoots. Some oreodonts may have gathered in herds, offering a little collective protection against predators, including the formidable cat-like nimravids. 

Being a herbivore required a balance between finding something delicious and avoiding becoming something delicious yourself.

What’s in a name? What’s in a tooth?

Despite the tempting association, oreodonts have nothing to do with chocolate biscuits dunked in milk. Their name combines the Greek roots for “mountain” and “tooth”, referring to the peaks and ridges of their molars. Think miniature mountain ranges tucked into a mouth. The tooth connection appears in familiar words such as dentist and orthodontist, though I suspect an oreodont orthodontist would have needed a particularly sturdy chair.

Teeth are among palaeontology’s most useful clues. Their size, proportions and arrangement of cusps and ridges can help distinguish one animal from another, sometimes down to species. Yet a single tooth does not always provide a tidy answer. A recent study of John Day oreodonts excluded certain isolated teeth from its analyses because they were too easily confused between groups. A good identification depends on knowing both what a feature reveals and where its limits lie.

There are intriguing clues elsewhere in the skull, too. Some oreodonts, including Leptauchenia, possessed greatly enlarged auditory bullae—the bony capsules enclosing the middle-ear cavities. These structures have been studied for what they might reveal about hearing and habitat. Enlarged middle-ear cavities can improve sensitivity to lower-frequency sounds in living mammals, but they do not, by themselves, tell us the size of an extinct animal’s external ears. Fossils invite us to listen carefully, even when their owners have been silent for millions of years.

The browsers of John Day

In Oregon, the John Day Formation preserves an extraordinary sequence of changing environments. Its middle and upper portions contain major fossil assemblages dating from approximately 30–18 million years ago. Volcanic ash, stream deposits and ancient soils accumulated across landscapes that became cooler and drier over time. The beautiful blue-green claystones of the Turtle Cove Member owe their colour to celadonite, a mineral formed during alteration of the volcanic ash. A lovely palette for a remarkably rich fossil archive.

Eporeodon occidentalis

One of the region’s familiar oreodonts is Eporeodon occidentalis, a stocky browser with four hooved toes and prominent canine teeth. Its imposing tusks accompanied a set of cheek teeth built for processing plants. 

Across the Turtle Cove landscape, oreodonts shared wooded and more open habitats with three-toed horses, mouse-deer and an assortment of predators. These communities changed through the millions of years preserved in the rock; they were never one enormous prehistoric gathering frozen in time.

Then there was Agriochoerus, a wonderfully unusual oreodont relative with curved claws instead of hooves. Its limb anatomy suggests that it could climb, perhaps using trees in a way comparable to living tree kangaroos. That interpretation gives us a delightful possibility: a sheep-sized browser taking its leafy dining arrangements upstairs. With nimravids in the neighbourhood, the option may have had considerable appeal.

Fresh research is still refining this story. A September 2026 study by Meaghan M. Emery-Wetherell, Nicholas A. Famoso and Joshua X. Samuels documented a major change around the Picture Gorge ignimbrite, a volcanic rock layer that helps researchers correlate the fossil-bearing beds. Agriochoerus disappeared locally, the large terrestrial Promerycochoerus arrived, and Eporeodon persisted but became smaller. 

Oreodont Diversity in the Kimberly Member

Regional oreodont diversity peaked in the Kimberly Member, roughly 26.6–25.5 million years ago, with as many as five species represented during that interval.

Each of the fellows you see on the left bear a familial resemblance to their peers but with slight differences.

That is what makes an oreodont fossil—or a carefully made cast—such a compelling introduction to deep time. 

Follow those mountain teeth into the surrounding rocks and an entire world begins to emerge: leaves overhead, ash settling through the air, and unfamiliar animals going about the wonderfully ordinary business of staying alive.

Lead Image: Cast of an oreodont fossil from the John Day Formation, Oregon. Oreodonts were extinct plant-eating mammals whose distinctive cheek teeth inspired their name, “mountain teeth”. This lovely was cast by Rod Bartlett, Vancouver Paleontological Society, back in the mid 2000s.

BEFORE THE FIRST FOSSILS: THE MISSING CHAPTER OF ANIMAL LIFE

Mongolian Base Camp

Somewhere in the immense stretch of time before familiar shells, claws and skeletons, our earliest animal ancestors began their evolutionary adventures. Finding out when they appeared is another matter entirely.

How do you find the beginning of a story when its opening pages may never have been preserved?

A study published in Science Advances on 2 October 2026 brings that question into sharp focus. Led by Orin M. Lole Durbin and colleagues, the research suggests that animal origins could extend back roughly 800–700 million years—considerably earlier than their widely accepted body fossil record. 

Crucially, this is an estimate from evolutionary analyses, rather than the discovery of an 800-million-year-old animal. The distinction matters. Deep time already has enough mysteries without us accidentally issuing a birth certificate.

Consider what a fossil actually tells us. A recognisable animal preserved in dated rock establishes that its kind existed by that time. It does not necessarily reveal when the lineage first evolved. Your oldest surviving family photograph works much the same way: it records someone’s presence on a particular occasion, without marking the beginning of the family.

An empty photograph is trickier. Was nobody there, or was the camera pointing elsewhere?

For palaeontologists, that is a serious question.

In China, the approximately 590-million-year-old Weng’an Biota preserves microscopic organisms with remarkable detail, yet contains no definitive animals. Its apparent silence has been used to help limit how far back animal origins could extend. The reasoning depends on an assumption: animals living then would have been preserved and recognised in those deposits.

Enter Mongolia, carrying a rather awkward piece of evidence.

Mongolia's Lake Khövsgöl

The researchers investigated microfossils from the Kheseen Biota, an assemblage dated broadly to about 550–526 million years ago. 

The Kheseen Biota comes from northern Mongolia, where rocks of the Kheseen Formation crop out in a discontinuous belt stretching roughly 250 kilometres along the western side of Lake Khövsgöl. 

These rocks record a world very different from the lake landscape we see today: an ancient marine basin where carbonate sediments, mud and phosphate-rich deposits accumulated. 

Within those phosphatic rocks, microscopic organisms were preserved in extraordinary detail, leaving a tiny window into an ocean that vanished more than half a billion years ago. It is a wonderfully humbling contrast—a vast geological landscape holding some of its most revealing secrets at a scale smaller than a grain of sand.

Its preservation and microscopic inhabitants resemble those of Weng’an. It, too, lacks definitive animals.

But here is the delicious complication: animals unquestionably existed somewhere in the world during that younger interval. Their absence from Kheseen cannot mean that the entire animal kingdom had yet to evolve.

It is rather like inspecting a beautifully preserved guest list from a gathering of botanists and concluding that nobody on Earth was a dentist.

The record may be excellent. The sample may still be selective.

Kheseen’s missing animals could reflect the environments represented, the conditions of preservation, or a combination of factors. Whatever the explanation, the comparison weakens the argument that Weng’an’s missing animals provide a dependable limit on animal origins.

This is where living animals enter our fossil detective story.

Researchers can compare genetic differences among species and use evolutionary models, anchored by fossil evidence, to estimate when their ancestral lineages separated. This approach is called a molecular clock.

Think of it as a clock that requires careful setting. Fossils supply reference points; assumptions about the oldest plausible ages also influence the answer.

The team tested older geological constraints in these analyses. Their results supported an origin for animals approximately 800–700 million years ago, demonstrating how strongly the estimated timing depends on the maximum ages supplied to the models.

That possibility takes us towards an extraordinary chapter of Earth history. The interval overlaps the approach to, and beginning of, the Cryogenian Period, associated with the immense glaciations popularly called Snowball Earth. Animal beginnings might therefore belong to a world entering some exceptionally dramatic climatic upheavals.

Imagine the challenge of finding such an ancient beginning. We are asking rocks to preserve something recognisable, survive geological upheaval, become exposed where someone can investigate them, and then yield a clue we know how to read.

A demanding filing system, geology.

The next step is to keep searching across different ancient environments and kinds of preservation, bringing body fossils, traces of activity and chemical evidence into the conversation. The precise age of animal origins remains unresolved.

For me, that uncertainty is part of the wonder.

Every fossil is a surviving fragment of a much larger world. Sometimes the most compelling discovery is realising how much of that world could still be missing.

The opening pages of our animal story may be out there.

We are learning where—and how—to look.

Image: Mongolia's Lake Khövsgöl by sayursaying.com

BLOOD, BONES & CREATURES OF THE DARK

A spooky adventure with the Fossil Huntress

Gather close, curious creatures. Tonight, we’re slipping into the shadows to meet animals whose lives are every bit as fascinating as their spooky reputations.

Our journey takes us from a vampire’s roost to the deep ocean, through the forests of Madagascar—and back into the fossil record.

Bring your curiosity. Perhaps leave your neck covered.

VAMPIRE BATS: DINNER WITH A BITE

Before Dracula donned his cape, evolution had already produced a flying mammal with a taste for blood.

Only three living bat species feed exclusively on blood. And their table manners deserve a little clarification: vampire bats make a small cut with sharp front teeth, then lap up the blood with their tongues. Think tiny midnight diner with very particular menu requirements.

But these little creatures have a surprisingly tender side. A successful feeder may share some of its meal with a hungry roostmate by regurgitating blood.

Yes, it sounds like a dreadful dinner invitation. For a hungry bat, it can be a lifesaving gift. Even vampires benefit from having good friends.

A VAMPIRE IN THE FOSSIL RECORD

Giant Vampire Bat, Desmodus draculae

Of course, this is the Fossil Huntress, so we must rummage through a few ancient bones.

Meet Desmodus draculae, an extinct giant vampire bat with a scientific name worthy of its own horror film. 

Larger than today’s common vampire bat, it inhabited parts of the Americas during the Pleistocene, with fossil finds stretching from Mexico to Argentina.

Picture an Ice Age landscape as daylight fades. Somewhere beyond the shelter of your fire, a vampire bat takes flight.  

Giant Vampire Bat, Desmodus draculae

Its fossil remains offer a tantalizing glimpse of an Ice Age world where vampire bats shared the landscape with giant ground sloths, armoured glyptodonts, heavy-bodied toxodonts, ancient horses and elephant relatives called gomphotheres.

Which of these ancient giants might have supplied a midnight meal? 

Horses seem plausible candidates, given that living vampire bats feed on them, while researchers have suggested that ground sloths—and even glyptodonts—may have offered accessible feeding sites around their feet. A glyptodont’s bony armour would have put much of its body off the menu, but softer, exposed areas could have left an opening for a determined diner.

Toxodonts and gomphotheres add to the intriguing possibilities, though we cannot confidently identify them as meals—or rule them out simply on the assumption of thick skin. The precise menu of Desmodus draculae remains a mystery.

Imagine a tiny winged visitor finding a vulnerable patch of skin on a sleeping Ice Age giant. The fossil record has excellent material for a Halloween story. It practically writes itself!

VAMPIRE SQUID: A CLOAK IN THE ABYSS

Vampyroteuthis infernalis

Now, down we go into the deep sea to meet Vampyroteuthis infernalis. Its scientific name translates to “vampire squid from hell.”

A rather dramatic introduction for an animal that eats drifting debris.

Despite its name, the vampire squid drinks no blood. It isn’t a true squid, either, but belongs to a separate branch of the cephalopod family tree. Its dark body and webbed arms give it a wonderfully cloak-like appearance.

Its dinner is “marine snow”: sinking organic material that includes the remains of tiny organisms and fecal particles. Yep, this fellow eats poop. Two slender feeding filaments help gather this falling feast from the surrounding water.

Vampire Squid drawn by Carl Chun, 1911

Imagine dressing like a gothic sea lord, receiving a name that promises eternal terror, and spending your evenings quietly collecting leftovers.

The image you see here on the left is a vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis infernalis) from the work of Carl Chun, a German marine biologist who led the pioneering Valdivia deep-sea expedition of 1898–1899. 

Chun formally described the species in 1903, and it was he who gave it a scientific name that translates to “vampire squid from hell”—quite the introduction for a little creature that spends its days gathering drifting ocean leftovers. 

His expedition helped reveal the extraordinary abundance and diversity of life hidden in the ocean’s dark depths. I am oftly fond of cephies of all kinds but this fellow holds a special place in my heart as a Halloween icon with a very practical approach to recycling.

THE AYE-AYE: SOMETHING TAPPING IN THE TREES

Aye-aye, Daubentonia madagascariensis

For our final encounter, we enter Madagascar’s nighttime forests.

There, an aye-aye (Daubentonia madagascariensis) moves through the branches. This nocturnal lemur has large ears and an extraordinary, slender middle finger—an appearance seemingly assembled for a moonlit ghost story.

Then comes the tapping.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The aye-aye taps wood and listens for clues to hidden cavities where insect larvae may be waiting. Once it locates a promising spot, it gnaws through the wood and uses its specialized finger to extract a meal. That mysterious scratching in the darkness? Someone looking for a grub.

Its unusual appearance conceals an ancient family connection. Aye-ayes are primates, related to Madagascar’s ring-tailed lemurs, sifakas, indris and tiny mouse lemurs. Their lineage branched away early from that of all other living lemurs, leaving today’s aye-aye as the sole surviving species of its family, Daubentoniidae. More distant relatives include the lorises and galagos of Africa and Asia.

And there was once a larger relative tapping through Madagascar’s ancient landscapes.

The extinct giant aye-aye, Daubentonia robusta, is known from subfossil remains found in southern and southwestern Madagascar. These relatively recent ancient bones reveal an animal with remarkably robust limbs, estimated to have weighed roughly two-and-a-half to five times as much as its living cousin. Imagine meeting that larger silhouette on a moonlit branch.

For deeper roots, we must look beyond Madagascar. Researchers have proposed that Plesiopithecus, a primate from Egypt around 34 million years ago, and Propotto, known from younger Miocene deposits in Kenya, were ancient relatives of the aye-aye lineage. These are proposed evolutionary relatives, rather than fossils of the modern aye-aye itself, offering tantalizing clues to an African chapter in its family history.

The fossil trail remains patchy, with enormous gaps in Madagascar’s early primate record. But the clues we do have make that little tapping sound all the more remarkable: a living animal finding its supper with adaptations shaped by a long and extraordinary evolutionary history.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

A midnight snack, with deep roots. That mysterious scratching in the darkness?

Someone looking for a grub.

A LITTLE WONDER IN THE DARK

A bat that shares its blood supper. A deep-sea “vampire” gathering marine snow. A forest primate tapping for hidden treats. An extinct vampire waiting to be discovered in ancient sediments.

Nature gives us plenty to shiver about—and even more to wonder at.

This Halloween, spare a little admiration for the creatures behind the costumes. Their adaptations, appetites and ancient histories tell stories no haunted house could invent.

Which would you join for a midnight adventure: the vampire bat, the vampire squid or the aye-aye?

Happy Halloween from the Fossil Huntress. May your treats be plentiful and your fossil finds delightfully frightful.

Image: A Vampire Squid (Vampyroteuthis infernalis) drawn by Carl Chun, 1911. Chun formally described the species in 1903, giving it a scientific name that translates to “vampire squid from hell”—quite the introduction for a little creature that spends its days gathering drifting ocean leftovers. His expedition helped reveal the extraordinary abundance and diversity of life hidden in the ocean’s dark depths.

KUMIMANU: THE GIANT PENGUIN THAT TIPPED THE SCALES

Kumimanu adapted from Nobu Tamura

Some penguins belong on postcards. This one deserves its own weigh station.

Around 57 million years ago, an enormous penguin swam through the seas of what is now Aotearoa New Zealand. Known from fossils described in 2023 as Kumimanu fordycei, this ancient marine lovely had an estimated body mass of around 150 kilograms.

That is a great deal of penguin.

The researchers’ calculations placed it among the strongest contenders for the heaviest penguin ever discovered. Its fossils come from rocks dated to between 59.5 and 55.5 million years ago, during the late Palaeocene—a time when life was exploring new possibilities following the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs.

A GIANT HIDING INSIDE A BOULDER

The story begins with fossil-bearing boulders on the coast of North Otago, on New Zealand’s South Island.

Palaeontologist Alan Tennyson of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa collected the penguin fossils studied by the team in 2016 and 2017. Locked inside the rock were clues to an ancient community of seabirds, including one exceptionally large individual.

Researchers created three-dimensional digital models of the bones to help study their anatomy. Among the remains was a remarkable humerus—the upper wing bone—that offered a way to investigate the bird’s size.

For those of us who love fossils, there is something especially pleasing about this part of the story. A boulder on a beach can hold the remains of an animal that once breathed, hunted and moved through a world we will never see.

The rock keeps its secrets until patient eyes and careful preparation bring them into view.

HOW DO YOU WEIGH A FOSSIL PENGUIN?

There are practical difficulties with asking a bird that has been dead for millions of years to step onto a scale.

Instead, palaeontologists look for relationships between the dimensions of bones and body mass in living animals. Those relationships can then help them estimate the mass of extinct relatives.

For this giant penguin, calculations using the length and width of the humerus produced estimates of approximately 148 and 160 kilograms. These are estimates with uncertainty, rather than a precise reading of the animal’s weight. Even so, both point to an exceptionally hefty bird.

Its height is less certain. We do not have a complete skeleton, and a heavy penguin is not necessarily the tallest penguin.

For comparison, large emperor penguins—the biggest penguins alive today—can weigh around 45 kilograms. Our fossil heavyweight could have outweighed three of those substantial birds combined.

WINGS FOR WATER

Penguins descend from flying birds, but their ancestors gradually became specialists in moving through water.

Once flight was lost, staying light enough to become airborne was no longer a requirement. Larger bodies became possible, and there were potential advantages to growing big.

A bulky, warm-blooded animal loses heat more slowly relative to its volume than a smaller one. For a bird spending time submerged, retaining warmth could make a considerable difference. Researchers have suggested that this may have helped drive the early evolution of giant penguins.

Greater size also raises intriguing questions about diving and feeding. Could these birds reach food that smaller penguins could not? Their bones invite us to investigate, although we cannot yet reconstruct their daily lives in detail.

AN ANCIENT PENGUIN WITH A DIFFERENT FLIPPER

The specimen described as Kumimanu fordycei was discovered in 2017, encased in a hard concretion. Fossil preparator Al Mannering carefully freed its bones from the rock.

The remains include a humerus, a vertebra and portions of other wing, shoulder-region and leg bones. They are now held at Te Papa in Wellington.

Those wing bones reveal an animal with some ancestral features, including flipper bones that were less flattened than those of living penguins. This was an early member of the penguin evolutionary story, with a combination of features different from the birds we know today.

The name fordycei honours New Zealand palaeontologist R. Ewan Fordyce and his contributions to understanding ancient life.

A LITTLE SCIENTIFIC NAME DETECTIVE WORK

There is a further twist to our giant’s story.

In a 2025 study, Gerald Mayr and colleagues questioned whether Kumimanu fordycei should be recognised as a separate species from the previously named Kumimanu biceae. They argued that the differences in size and bone shape could fall within the variation expected within one species.

They therefore considered K. fordycei likely to be a junior synonym of K. biceae. In everyday language, that means the newer name may refer to the same species as the older name.

This is part of the fascination of palaeontology. Finding a fossil begins a conversation. Further specimens, comparisons and analyses can change how we interpret it.

Whether these remains represent a separate species or an especially large individual of an already named one, the bones still belonged to an extraordinary penguin.

A BEACH WORTH VISITING—FROM A SAFE DISTANCE IN TIME

I have a soft spot for fossils that overturn our everyday expectations.

We know penguins as charismatic seabirds: diving, calling, tending their young and bustling about on shore. Then the fossil record introduces a relative with enough heft to make us reconsider the whole picture.

Somewhere along an ancient New Zealand coast, a very large bird once emerged from the sea. Millions of years later, pieces of its skeleton emerged from stone.

A beach boulder, a patient preparator and a remarkable wing bone have given us a glimpse of that encounter.

And what a lovely great penguin it was.

WYOTEUTHIS: THE CHUNKY BELEMNITE FROM THE JURASSIC SEA

Wyoteuthis linsterorum, holotype

Some fossils make you pause because they are beautiful. Others catch your eye because something about them simply does not fit.

Two unusually stout fossils from Wyoming have done just that, revealing a newly named marine animal with a wonderfully distinctive shape—and an unexpected place in the history of ancient oceans.

Meet Wyoteuthis linsterorum, a squid-like cephalopod that lived around 160 million years ago. Its scientific description was published in September 2026, giving a name to a creature whose story had been waiting decades to unfold.

A belemnite with a little extra roundness

If you have collected belemnites, you may know their smooth, pointed guards: the solid internal structures that often survive after the softer parts of these marine animals have disappeared.

Wyoteuthis takes that familiar form in an unusual direction. Its guard is remarkably broad, reaching about six centimetres across. The researchers describe these as the thickest belemnite guards yet known.

Wyoteuthis linsterorum

That makes it a wonderfully chunky fossil, though a thick guard does not automatically tell us how large—or how round—the living animal was. Reconstructing its soft body remains a more uncertain undertaking.

An ancient family with a late-surviving branch

The surprise goes beyond its proportions.

The fossils belong to the Megateuthididae, a belemnite family that flourished earlier in the Jurassic but had largely disappeared before Wyoteuthis lived.

These specimens reveal a surviving branch of that family in the northeastern Pacific region. 

Their discovery adds a small but significant piece to our understanding of where ancient marine lineages persisted.

There is something deeply pleasing about that. A fossil can be both a physical object you hold in your hand and evidence that changes the shape of a much larger story.

Two finds, decades of curiosity

The first specimen was found in the late 1990s by Dr Burkhard Pohl. A second, discovered by fossil collector Cliff Linster, was donated to the Wyoming Dinosaur Center in 2019.

Together, they helped researchers recognise a new species. The name linsterorum honours Cliff and his family. Cliff died in June 2026, before the research was published.

The study brought together Alexey Ippolitov, Jessica Lippincott, William Wahl and Dean Lomax. Both fossils are reported on display at the Wyoming Dinosaur Center in Thermopolis.

For those of us who love looking closely at fossils, this is a lovely reminder to stay curious about the familiar. An odd shape deserves a second look. So does the specimen that refuses to fit neatly beside its neighbours.

Sometimes, a new chapter in the history of life begins with someone noticing that one fossil looks a little different.

Suggested image caption

The unusually stout guard of Wyoteuthis linsterorum, a newly described Jurassic belemnite from Wyoming. Image: Ippolitov, Lippincott, Wahl & Lomax (2026), Figure 5, Papers in Palaeontology. Source, CC BY.

Further reading

Ippolitov, A. P., Lippincott, J. L., Wahl, W. R. & Lomax, D. R. (2026). ‘The big chunky belemnite’: a new relict megateuthidid from the Oxfordian (Late Jurassic) of Wyoming, USA, and its place in the evolutionary history of the group. Papers in Palaeontology, 12, e70123.

Figure 5: Wyoteuthis linsterorum, holotype specimen. Image: Ippolitov, Lippincott, Wahl & Lomax (2026), Figure 5, Papers in Palaeontology. Source, CC BY. The holotype—the specimen used to name the species—with photographs and CT sections.

Figure 6: Wyoteuthis linsterorum gen. et sp. nov., paratype, WDC JSI-22.  The second specimen, showing its chunky shape and internal anatomy.

SINOSAUROPTERYX AND ARCHAEOPTERYX: FEATHERS, FOSSILS AND THE ORIGINS OF BIRDS

Sinosauropteryx and Archaeopteryx

A feather can change how we see an entire animal.

Preserved beside a delicate skeleton, its faint outline tells us something bones alone cannot: this ancient creature wore plumage. 

Two remarkable fossil animals, Sinosauropteryx and Archaeopteryx, have helped transform our understanding of dinosaurs and the origins of birds.

One was a small predator with a fuzzy coat and a striped tail. The other had feathered wings, sharp teeth and a long, bony tail. 

Together, they invite us to look beyond the familiar image of dinosaurs as entirely scaly giants—and look a little more closely at the birds outside our windows.

SINOSAUROPTERYX: A DINOSAUR IN A FUZZY COAT

Sinosauropteryx lived in what is now northeastern China approximately 125–122 million years ago, during the Early Cretaceous. About a metre long, much of that length taken up by its slender tail, this small theropod walked on two legs and hunted little animals. A fossil preserving a lizard in its stomach offers a wonderfully direct glimpse of dinner.

But the feature that made Sinosauropteryx famous lies around its skeleton.

A fringe of fine, filamentous structures traces parts of the body: the remains of a simple feather covering. These were unlike the broad, neatly vaned flight feathers of a raven or eagle. They would have given the animal a soft, fuzzy appearance.

First discovered in 1996, Sinosauropteryx became a landmark in the study of feathered dinosaurs. Here was evidence that plumage extended beyond early birds into other dinosaur branches.

That distinction matters. A feather covering does not automatically make an animal a flyer.

Research on the preserved colour patterns has also revealed alternating bands along the tail, a darker back, a lighter underside and a dark facial marking described as a “bandit mask.” These patterns suggest camouflage played a role in its life. Countershading—a darker upper surface above a paler belly—can reduce the visual effect of shadows, helping an animal blend into its surroundings.

Even through stone, we can begin to recover something of this little hunter’s appearance.

ARCHAEOPTERYX: AN ANCIENT WING IN LIMESTONE

Travel farther back, to approximately 150 million years ago, and we meet Archaeopteryx.

Its fossils come from the Late Jurassic limestones of southern Germany, particularly the celebrated Solnhofen region. These deposits preserve extraordinary details, including the impressions of feathers surrounding delicate bones.

Look at an Archaeopteryx fossil and the wings immediately catch your eye. Long feathers spread outward from the forelimbs, giving the animal an unmistakably birdlike outline.

Then look again.

There are teeth in the jaws, clawed fingers on the wings and a long tail supported by a series of vertebrae. This combination of features makes Archaeopteryx especially valuable for understanding the early evolution of birds.

Its name means “ancient wing”—a fitting name for an animal that has prompted generations of palaeontologists to ask how dinosaurs took to the air.

Could it fly? Research examining the internal geometry of its wing bones supports active, flapping flight. Its capabilities and wing stroke, however, differed from those of modern birds. The evidence points towards short flights rather than the sustained aerial journeys we see in many birds today.

FEATHERS BEFORE FLIGHT

There is a delightful wrinkle in this story: the fuzzy, flightless Sinosauropteryx lived millions of years after the winged Archaeopteryx.

They do not form a simple sequence in which one became the other. Evolution branches. Different dinosaur lineages lived with different combinations of feathers, skeletons and ways of moving.

The broader fossil record shows that feathers were present in dinosaurs that could not fly. Early plumage may have helped with insulation, display and other functions before feathers became part of the equipment for aerial travel. The flight feathers of birds belong within that longer evolutionary history.

Birds are living theropod dinosaurs. The chickadee investigating a branch, the gull turning above the shoreline and the raven watching you with considerable interest all belong to a dinosaur lineage that survives today.

FOLLOWING THE STORY IN OSLO

If your travels take you to Norway, the Natural History Museum in Oslo, or Naturhistorisk museum, offers an opportunity to explore this connection between dinosaurs and birds.

The museum has featured Sinosauropteryx and Archaeopteryx through reconstructed displays, bringing their feathered forms into three dimensions. Its exhibition material describes a downy Sinosauropteryx model, while reporting on its bird evolution displays documents a fully feathered Archaeopteryx reconstruction. These are representations of the ancient animals; visitors should check individual labels to distinguish models, casts and original fossils.

The museum’s current permanent exhibition, Evolution of Life, is housed in Brøggers hus. It follows life through geological time, exploring changing ecosystems and important evolutionary developments among animals and plants. Fossils provide the clues connecting these ancient worlds.

Located at Sars’ gate 1, 0562 Oslo, Norway, the museum grounds include the Botanical Garden. Beyond palaeontology, visitors can explore exhibitions on animals, minerals, geology and climate. Tøyen metro station is approximately a six-minute walk from the southern entrance in Monrads gate. Check the museum’s official website for current exhibitions, opening hours and admission information, particularly if you hope to see a specific display.

Lead Image: Asset ID: 2704872271

SEA DRAGONS: THE REMARKABLE MARINE REPTILES OF ANCIENT OCEANS

Long before whales travelled our oceans, extraordinary marine reptiles hunted beneath the waves.

Some had enormous eyes. Others had long, tooth-filled jaws, powerful flippers and streamlined bodies beautifully adapted for life at sea.

Among the most remarkable were the ichthyosaurs, whose name means "fish lizards."

These ancient marine reptiles looked remarkably like modern dolphins, although they were not closely related to them.

Their story is one of evolution's most fascinating experiments.

MEET THE ICHTHYOSAURS

Ichthyosaurs first appeared during the Early Triassic, more than 240 million years ago, and survived until the early Late Cretaceous.

Their ancestors were land-dwelling reptiles that returned to the water, eventually evolving bodies wonderfully suited to an aquatic existence.

Many developed streamlined shapes, powerful tails and paddle-like limbs.

Their resemblance to dolphins is an example of convergent evolution: unrelated animals independently evolving similar features because they face similar challenges in their environments.

A streamlined body is rather useful when your dinner is swimming away from you.

GIANTS OF THE ANCIENT SEAS

Not all ichthyosaurs were small, dolphin-sized hunters.

Some became enormous.

The Late Triassic ichthyosaur Shonisaurus popularis, known from Nevada, reached impressive lengths and inhabited seas that covered parts of western North America.

Even larger ichthyosaurs have been proposed from fragmentary remains, although estimating their full size is difficult when scientists have only a few bones to work with.

These discoveries remind us how much remains hidden in ancient marine sediments.

BABIES BORN AT SEA

One of the most wonderful things we know about ichthyosaurs comes from fossils preserving mothers with developing embryos.

These animals gave birth to live young rather than returning to land to lay eggs.

Some remarkable specimens even preserve evidence of birth.

Imagine the extraordinary circumstances required for such a fleeting moment to become part of the fossil record.

It is a rare window into the lives of animals that disappeared tens of millions of years ago.

WHAT DID THEY EAT?

Many ichthyosaurs hunted fish and squid-like cephalopods, using their sharp teeth to seize slippery prey.

Some species had different tooth shapes and feeding specialisations, suggesting that ichthyosaurs occupied a variety of ecological roles.

Fossilised stomach contents and coprolites — fossilised faeces — can help palaeontologists understand what ancient predators ate.

Even prehistoric poop has a story to tell.

THE OCEANS STILL HOLD THEIR SECRETS

Marine reptile fossils have been discovered across the world, including spectacular specimens from British Columbia.

The Triassic rocks of northeastern British Columbia have yielded important ichthyosaur fossils, including the giant Shastasaurus sikanniensis.

Each new specimen helps scientists reconstruct the ecosystems of ancient oceans, the animals that inhabited them and the remarkable evolutionary changes that unfolded beneath the waves.

FOSSIL HUNTRESS FIELD NOTE

Ichthyosaurs were reptiles, not dinosaurs. Dinosaurs were primarily terrestrial animals, while ichthyosaurs belonged to a separate evolutionary lineage that became highly specialised for life in the sea.

They shared their oceans with ammonoids, fishes and many other marine creatures whose fossils we can still discover today.

Image: Ichthyosaur Fossil Asset ID: 2547389153

HARRY'S FOSSIL ROOM: ANCIENT TREASURES AND THE ART OF FOSSIL PREPARATION

Baltic Amber. Photo: Harry Tabiner

There is something rather wonderful about people who can hold a small piece of stone or amber in their hands and see an entire ancient world waiting to be revealed.

My friend Harry Tabiner, based in the United Kingdom, is one of those people. 

A passionate fossil collector with a particular fondness for amber and fossil preparation, Harry has a wonderful eye for the tiny details that make our prehistoric world so fascinating.

Through his Instagram page, Harry's Fossil Room, he shares glimpses of his collection and the remarkable creatures preserved within it.

And some of those creatures are very small indeed.

A PASSION FOR ANCIENT LIFE

For many of us, collecting fossils begins with curiosity. A curious shape in a rock, an ammonite along a shoreline or a fragment of something that once lived in an ancient sea.

Then comes the wonderful question: What exactly have I found?

That curiosity is part of what makes fossil collecting so rewarding. Each specimen is a little mystery, with clues to its identity, age, environment and evolutionary history.

Amber with Insect & Plant Inclusions

Harry's interests include both fossils preserved in rock and the extraordinary world of amber, where ancient insects and plant material can remain suspended in fossilised tree resin for millions of years.

His enthusiasm for preparation and polishing adds another dimension to collecting. Rather than simply admiring a specimen as it is, Harry enjoys the careful work that helps reveal what lies beneath its surface.

POLISHING WINDOWS INTO THE PAST

One of the things I particularly admire about Harry is the care he puts into his amber collection.

Harry polishes many of his amber specimens himself, carefully working their surfaces to reveal the ancient treasures preserved within.

Amber is fossilised tree resin, and while some pieces are naturally transparent, others have weathered or cloudy surfaces that obscure their contents.

Careful polishing can improve clarity, allowing collectors and researchers to examine the delicate inclusions inside.

Insect in Amber. Harry Tabiner

It is a process that requires patience. Amber is relatively soft and can scratch, crack or suffer damage from excessive heat during polishing. Removing too much material may also damage an inclusion close to the surface.

The reward for this careful work can be extraordinary.

A seemingly unremarkable piece of resin may reveal tiny insects, plant fragments or other evidence of an ancient forest ecosystem.

And that is where the magic of amber really begins.

A GOLDEN WORLD FILLED WITH ANCIENT LIFE

Among the specimens Harry has shared is a beautiful, clear piece of Baltic amber containing an assortment of fossil insects and abundant plant material.

Held between his fingers, the golden resin glows with warm yellow and honey-coloured tones. Dark fragments of vegetation extend through the amber, creating a miniature landscape of ancient organic material.

At first glance, the specimen is beautiful simply as an object.

Look more closely, however, and an entirely different world begins to emerge.

One of Harry's close-up photographs reveals a delicate insect preserved within the amber. Its body, wings and fine wing veins remain visible, offering a remarkable glimpse of a creature that lived millions of years before humans appeared.

These tiny details are scientifically valuable. Wing venation, body structures and other anatomical features can help palaeontologists identify ancient insects and understand their evolutionary relationships.

The specimen is also a reminder that fossil discoveries are not always enormous bones or spectacular skeletons.

Sometimes the most remarkable stories are found in something small enough to fit between your fingers.

THE ANCIENT FORESTS OF THE BALTIC

Baltic amber is among the world's best-known fossil resins.

Much of it is associated with Eocene deposits, approximately 34–48 million years old, although the precise age and geological history of individual pieces can be complicated.

During the Eocene, northern Europe supported forests very different from those we know today. The climate was generally warmer, and the region was home to diverse communities of plants, insects and other animals.

Resin produced by ancient trees occasionally trapped small organisms or fragments of vegetation.

Over geological time, some of that resin was buried, chemically transformed and preserved as amber.

Today, these golden pieces offer remarkable insights into ancient forest ecosystems.

Scientists have identified thousands of kinds of organisms in Baltic amber, including beetles, flies, ants, spiders, mites and numerous other tiny creatures. Plant fragments, pollen and other inclusions provide additional clues about the forests themselves.

Together, these fossils help reconstruct ecosystems that disappeared tens of millions of years ago.

THE ART OF FOSSIL PREPARATION

Arnioceras semicostatum block

Harry's interest in fossil preparation reflects another fascinating aspect of palaeontology.

Finding a fossil is often only the beginning of the journey.

Many fossils remain partly or almost completely enclosed in surrounding rock, known as the matrix. Sometimes you get a great split when you hit them with your hammer and sometimes not.

The gorgeous Arnioceras semicostatum multi block shown here is a great example. It was found by Harry many years ago on the Holderness coast. It’s chock-o-block with colourful calcite filled ammonites. 

The block did not split well on his first attempts but on this occasion Harry was still delighted with the outcome because there were very few broken ammonites.  

Preparing them involves carefully removing that material while protecting the fossil.

Depending on the specimen, preparators may use fine hand tools, magnification, specialised pneumatic equipment or other techniques.

The work requires patience, precision and an understanding of how the fossil and surrounding material respond to different tools.

Some specimens can take many hours, days or even longer to prepare.

And while polishing amber is quite different from removing rock around a fossil, both activities share an important principle: careful preparation can reveal details that would otherwise remain hidden.

For those of us who love fossils, watching a specimen emerge is one of the most satisfying parts of the process.

It is a wonderful combination of science, craftsmanship and curiosity.

THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE FOSSILS

Dactylioceras ammonite

One of my favourite things about the fossil community is the people.

Over the years, I have met wonderful collectors, researchers, preparators and enthusiastic fossil hunters who generously share their discoveries, knowledge and photographs.

Some work professionally in palaeontology. Others pursue their interests in their spare time, building collections, learning preparation techniques and exploring the extraordinary history of life on Earth.

There is room for all kinds of curiosity in this community.

Harry is one of those enthusiasts whose interest in ancient life is reflected in the time and care he devotes to his specimens.

His amber and fossil photographs are a lovely example of how much there is to discover when we look closely.

A piece of golden resin becomes a window into an ancient forest. A tiny insect becomes evidence of an ecosystem that flourished millions of years ago. A lovely Dactylioceras ammonite is revealed from a nodule.

And the careful work of a collector helps bring those details into view.

FOLLOW HARRY'S FOSSIL ROOM

If you enjoy fossils, amber and the fascinating process of revealing ancient life, you can follow Harry's work through his social media pages.

Instagram: Harry's Fossil Room

Facebook: Harry Tabiner — Tabfish

Thank you, Harry, for sharing these beautiful amber and fossil photographs and for helping us appreciate the extraordinary details preserved within these golden windows into the past. You continue to inspire me daily!

FOSSIL HUNTRESS FIELD NOTE

Amber inclusions can preserve remarkable three-dimensional details, including insect wings, antennae, legs and even tiny hairs.

Unlike conventional fossils, which often preserve mineralised hard parts or impressions in rock, amber can retain the external structures of small organisms with exceptional clarity.

The age of amber depends on the deposit where it formed. Baltic amber is generally Eocene in age, while some other deposits are considerably older.

For anyone interested in fossil collecting, amber offers a fascinating opportunity to explore the smaller inhabitants of ancient ecosystems.

Photographs: Harry Tabiner / Harry's Fossil Room. Reproduced with permission. 

A stunning Arnioceras semicostatum multi block found by Harry Tabiner many years ago on the Holderness coast. It’s packed with colourful calcite filled ammonites. The block didn’t split very well but on this occasion Harry was still delighted with the outcome because of there being very few broken ammonites. And, just look at those colours! Breathtaking.  

Dactylioceras ammonite in a nodule. 10 cm across and displayed inside the nodule were it has been for the last 185 million years. Originally from the Lower Jurassic Upper Lias of the Yorkshire coast but found as a glacial erratic on the Holderness coast by Harry Tabiner many years ago and expertly prepped October 2026.

TRAPPED IN TIME: THE EXTRAORDINARY FOSSILS PRESERVED IN AMBER

Fossilized Insect in Amber

A tiny insect lands on the sticky surface of a tree, unaware that this ordinary moment might become part of the geological record.

Millions of years later, that insect may still be visible, suspended inside a golden piece of fossilised resin.

Its delicate wings, slender legs and even the finest hairs on its body can sometimes be preserved in astonishing detail.

Welcome to the remarkable world of amber fossils.

WHAT IS AMBER?

Amber begins as resin produced by trees.

Fresh resin is sticky and can trap insects, spiders, plant fragments and other small organisms that encounter it.

Under suitable conditions, buried resin undergoes chemical changes over geological time, eventually becoming amber.

Unlike many fossils preserved in sedimentary rock, amber inclusions can retain extraordinarily fine three-dimensional details.

These tiny time capsules allow palaeontologists to examine ancient organisms in ways that are rarely possible with conventional fossils.

AN ENTIRE WORLD IN A DROP OF RESIN

Amber has preserved an astonishing diversity of prehistoric life.

Scientists have discovered ancient ants, beetles, flies, spiders, flowers, feathers and even fragments of vertebrate animals.

Some specimens capture interactions between organisms, including predators and prey or insects associated with plants.

These discoveries offer rare evidence of how ancient ecosystems functioned.

Rather than simply telling us which species existed, amber can sometimes show us how they lived together.

THE CRETACEOUS FORESTS OF MYANMAR

Some of the most scientifically significant amber fossils come from deposits in northern Myanmar, dating to approximately 99 million years ago.

These Cretaceous specimens have revealed an extraordinary diversity of insects and other organisms from a tropical forest ecosystem.

Researchers have described unusual insects, delicate flowers, feathered remains and many other remarkable inclusions.

However, Myanmar amber also raises serious ethical concerns relating to mining, conflict, provenance and the ownership of specimens.

For palaeontologists, understanding where a fossil came from and how it was obtained is an essential part of responsible scientific research.

CAN WE FIND DINOSAUR DNA IN AMBER?

It is a wonderful idea, made famous by Jurassic Park: extract ancient DNA from a blood-filled mosquito and bring dinosaurs back to life.

Unfortunately, real science is rather less accommodating.

DNA breaks down over time, and scientists have not recovered authentic dinosaur DNA from Mesozoic amber.

Amber can preserve astonishing physical details, but it does not provide a reliable way to resurrect extinct dinosaurs.

The real discoveries are fascinating enough without bringing a Tyrannosaurus rex into the modern world.

WINDOWS INTO VANISHED FORESTS

Important amber deposits have been discovered in the Baltic region, the Dominican Republic, Lebanon, Canada and many other places.

Each deposit captures a different chapter of Earth's history.

Some preserve ancient tropical forests. Others reveal ecosystems from cooler climates or much earlier geological periods.

Together, they help scientists reconstruct vanished landscapes, identify extinct species and understand the evolution of insects, plants and their ecological relationships.

FOSSIL HUNTRESS FIELD NOTE

Not every golden-coloured piece of fossil resin is amber. Copal is younger resin that has not undergone the same degree of fossilisation. Scientists examine its chemistry, geological context and physical properties to help distinguish it from amber.

The next time you see a piece of amber containing a tiny insect, remember that you are looking at more than a beautiful fossil.

You are looking at a moment in an ancient life, preserved across millions of years.

FEATHERED DINOSAURS: WHEN THE ANCIENT WORLD GREW WINGS

Dinosaurs were not all scaly giants with fearsome teeth and thunderous footsteps. Some were small, beautifully feathered creatures with striped tails, delicate plumage and more in common with the birds visiting our gardens than the monsters of Hollywood.

One remarkable fossil discovery from northeastern China helped change how we picture these ancient animals. Meet Sinosauropteryx prima, a little predator whose fossilised feathers offered scientists an extraordinary glimpse into the evolution of birds.

And here's the wonderful part: dinosaurs never entirely disappeared. Their descendants are still very much with us today.

Imagine discovering a dinosaur fossil so beautifully preserved that you can see the delicate impressions of feathers surrounding its bones.

Not just a skeleton, but a glimpse of an animal as it appeared millions of years ago, complete with the beginnings of a story that would eventually lead to the birds singing outside our windows.

For palaeontologists, feathered dinosaurs are among the most remarkable discoveries of the past few decades. They have transformed our understanding of dinosaur evolution and helped reveal something extraordinary: birds are living dinosaurs.

A DINOSAUR DRESSED IN FEATHERS

Sinosauropteryx with Dalinghosaurus

One of the most famous feathered dinosaurs is Sinosauropteryx prima, a small meat-eating dinosaur discovered in northeastern China.

Living approximately 125 million years ago during the Early Cretaceous, this little predator had relatively short arms, a long tail, sharp teeth and a covering of simple, filament-like feathers.

Unlike the broad flight feathers of modern birds, these early structures were more like fuzzy filaments. They may have helped the animal regulate its body temperature, communicate with other dinosaurs or display its colours.

Researchers studying preserved pigment-bearing structures have even proposed that Sinosauropteryx sported reddish-brown and pale bands along its tail.

Imagine that! A dinosaur with a striped tail.

DID FEATHERS EVOLVE FOR FLIGHT?

Here is where the story gets particularly interesting.

Feathers did not necessarily begin as flight equipment.

Many feathered dinosaurs were unable to fly. Their feathers may initially have served other purposes, including insulation, display and camouflage.

Over millions of years, feathers became increasingly complex. In some dinosaur lineages, they eventually helped support gliding and powered flight.

The evolutionary journey was not a straight line, but a branching tree filled with experiments, adaptations and remarkable animals.

WHERE DO WE FIND FEATHERED DINOSAURS?

Some of the world's most spectacular feathered dinosaur fossils come from the Jehol Biota of northeastern China, particularly Liaoning Province.

Fine-grained sediments deposited in ancient lakes, together with volcanic activity in the region, helped preserve extraordinary details of prehistoric life.

These deposits have revealed feathers, plants, insects, fish and other creatures that once shared these ancient ecosystems.

Each fossil adds another piece to the puzzle of how dinosaurs lived, behaved and evolved.

THE DINOSAURS ARE STILL WITH US

The next time you watch a raven hop along a branch or a gull glide across the ocean, consider its remarkable ancestry.

Birds are the surviving branch of the dinosaur family tree.

The great non-avian dinosaurs disappeared approximately 66 million years ago, but their feathered relatives survived and diversified into the thousands of bird species we know today.

Our world is still filled with dinosaurs. Some simply learned to sing.

FOSSIL HUNTRESS FIELD NOTE

Feather impressions are exceptionally rare. Most dinosaur fossils preserve bones and teeth, but under extraordinary conditions, delicate soft tissues and feather structures can also survive. These rare fossils help us reconstruct animals that would otherwise remain little more than skeletons.

Lead Image: Sinosauropteryx prima Fossils and Interpretive Drawings. The plumage distribution is mapped out across each specimen, with feathers shown in brown, internal soft tissues and pigment from the eyes shaded gray, and vertebrate stomach contents in light blue. NIGP 12786.

Image: Reconstruction of Sinosauropteryx in the predicted open habitats in which it lived around the Jehol lakes, preying on the lizard Dalinghosaurus. (Robert Nicholls, Fiann M. Smithwick, Innes C. Cuthill, Jakob Vinther (2017). Countershading and Stripes in the Theropod Dinosaur Sinosauropteryx Reveal Heterogeneous Habitats in the Early Cretaceous Jehol Biota doi:10.1016/j.cub.2017.09.032.

FROGFISH: THE FISH THAT WALKS, FISHES AND SWALLOWS ITS DINNER WHOLE

Frogfish ready for its next meal

FROGFISH: THE FISH THAT WALKS, FISHES AND SWALLOWS ITS DINNER WHOLE

Imagine a fish that looks like a sponge, walks like a rather disgruntled frog, carries a fishing rod on its head and can swallow another fish almost as large as itself.

Welcome to the wonderfully peculiar world of frogfish.

These extraordinary little predators belong to the family Antennariidae, part of the anglerfish order Lophiiformes.

They are relatives of our fabulous red-lipped batfish, although frogfish have largely abandoned the lipstick in favour of camouflage.

And what camouflage it is.

Some resemble colourful sea sponges. Others look like algae-covered rocks, lumps of coral or bits of seaweed that have seen better days.

But beneath those wonderfully deceptive disguises lurks one of the ocean's most astonishing ambush predators.

A FISH THAT PREFERS WALKING

Most fish spend their lives swimming.

Frogfish, apparently, did not receive that particular memo.

Instead, many spend their time perched on rocks, coral or the seafloor, using their modified pectoral fins to shuffle about.

Their pelvic fins can also help them brace and move across the bottom.

The result is a rather charming, if somewhat ungainly, underwater walk.

Imagine a little fish in an oversized sponge costume stomping about the reef, occasionally stopping to glare at passing marine life.

Some frogfish can swim when necessary, and a few use jet-like propulsion by forcing water through their gill openings.

But why bother swimming when dinner might come to you?

THE MASTER OF DISGUISE

Painted Frogfish, Master of Disguise

Frogfish are among the most remarkable camouflage artists in the marine world.

Their bodies may be covered in bumps, fleshy projections, irregular markings and colours that help them blend into their surroundings.

The hairy frogfish, Antennarius striatus, can sport long, skin-like appendages that make it resemble a shaggy clump of seaweed.

The painted frogfish, Antennarius pictus, may resemble a brightly coloured sponge.

And the giant frogfish, Antennarius commerson, can grow to roughly 38 centimetres long, making it a rather substantial lump of apparently innocent reef decoration.

Some frogfish can change colour over time, although this is not the instantaneous colour-changing performance we associate with certain cephalopods.

Their disguise serves two purposes.

It helps them avoid being noticed by predators.

And it allows them to remain almost invisible to unsuspecting prey.

There is something wonderfully unfair about being eaten by what you thought was a sponge.

THE FISH WITH A FISHING ROD

Now for one of my favourite evolutionary inventions.

Frogfish have a modified dorsal-fin spine called an illicium, which acts rather like a miniature fishing rod.

At its tip is a lure called an esca.

Depending on the species, this lure may resemble a worm, a tiny fish or another tempting morsel.

The frogfish waves its lure near its mouth, hoping to attract the attention of a hungry little fish.

The unsuspecting visitor approaches.

Closer.

Closer still.

And then — GULP.

Dinner disappears.

No chasing. No elaborate pursuit. No need to book a table.

Just a fishing rod attached to your head and an extraordinary amount of patience.

THE FASTEST DINNER IN TOWN

Frogfish possess one of the most impressive feeding mechanisms in the animal kingdom.

When prey comes within range, a frogfish can rapidly expand its enormous mouth cavity, creating suction that pulls the unfortunate visitor inside.

The strike can happen in just a few milliseconds.

Their mouths can expand dramatically, allowing some frogfish to consume prey approaching their own body size.

They may even eat other frogfish. Family dinners must be rather tense. Imagine inviting your cousin over for lunch and discovering that you are lunch.

This astonishing feeding system is an example of suction feeding, a technique found in many fishes but taken to remarkable extremes by frogfish.

Their specialised jaws and expandable mouths allow them to capture prey with very little warning.

One moment, a small fish is investigating a promising-looking worm. The next, it has vanished into what appeared to be a harmless lump of coral. Nature can be wonderfully inventive. And occasionally rather rude.

WHO ARE THEIR RELATIVES?

Frogfish are members of the order Lophiiformes, the anglerfishes.

Their extended family includes some of the most peculiar creatures in the ocean.

There are the red-lipped batfishes, which walk across the seafloor looking permanently unimpressed.

There are monkfishes, with enormous flattened heads and mouths designed for swallowing unsuspecting prey.

And there are the famous deep-sea anglerfishes, some of which use glowing lures to attract prey in the darkness.

Not all anglerfishes live in the deep sea, and not all have glowing lures.

Frogfish generally inhabit tropical and subtropical marine environments, often around reefs, rocky bottoms and other habitats where camouflage is particularly useful.

They have taken the anglerfish family's remarkable fishing apparatus and turned it into a wonderfully effective tool for ambush hunting.

One branch of the family lives in darkness.

Another wanders about wearing lipstick.

And the frogfish sits disguised as a sponge, waiting for something edible to make a terrible decision.

FROGFISH IN THE FOSSIL RECORD

Now let's travel back through deep time.

The living frogfish family, Antennariidae, has a limited fossil record. We cannot trace every modern frogfish species neatly backwards through millions of years of preserved ancestors.

But the broader anglerfish lineage has a fascinating fossil history.

One particularly important fossil is Histionotophorus bassani, an extinct anglerfish known from the Eocene deposits of Monte Bolca in northern Italy.

The Eocene Epoch lasted from approximately 56 to 33.9 million years ago.

The famous Monte Bolca fossil beds preserve an extraordinary assemblage of marine fishes from roughly 50 million years ago, when the region was part of a warm marine environment.

Among the remarkable fossil fishes described from Monte Bolca are early representatives of the anglerfish lineage, helping palaeontologists understand how this unusual group evolved.

These fossils are not necessarily direct ancestors of living frogfish.

Instead, they provide evidence that the wider evolutionary group to which frogfish belong was already present in ancient Eocene seas.

There is an important difference between finding a fossil of a modern family and finding an older fossil belonging to its broader evolutionary lineage.

Both are valuable, but they tell us different parts of the story.

Frogfish themselves are difficult to document through fossils, partly because their delicate skeletal structures and the environments in which they live do not always favour preservation.

That leaves some wonderful questions.

When did their extraordinary camouflage evolve?

How early did their ancestors begin using specialised fins to walk along the seafloor?

And when did their fishing apparatus become the highly effective hunting tool we see today?

Fossils, comparative anatomy and genetic research all help scientists investigate these questions.

Perhaps one day an extraordinary fossil frogfish will emerge from an ancient seabed and help fill another gap in this remarkable evolutionary story.

I do hope it looks like a sponge.

FIVE FROGFISH FACTS TO IMPRESS YOUR FRIENDS

1. Frogfish can fish for fish. Their modified dorsal-fin spine carries a lure that helps attract prey directly towards their mouths.

2. They can swallow astonishingly large meals. Their expandable jaws and rapid suction feeding allow some species to consume prey approaching their own size.

3. They are masters of disguise. Depending on the species, frogfish can resemble sponges, algae, coral or other parts of their marine surroundings.

4. They have unusual ways of moving. Many use their modified fins to walk or brace themselves, while some can also propel themselves through the water by expelling water from their gill openings.

5. They are related to deep-sea anglerfish. Although they generally live in shallower environments, frogfish share an evolutionary history with some of the strangest predators in the deep ocean.

THE JOY OF BEING EXTRAORDINARILY ODD

What I love most about frogfish is how beautifully they demonstrate the creativity of evolution.

Here is an animal that has evolved a remarkable combination of camouflage, specialised movement, an extraordinary feeding mechanism and a fishing lure built directly into its anatomy.

Its relatives appear in fossil deposits tens of millions of years old, connecting this modern marine oddity to an ancient and wonderfully diverse evolutionary lineage.

And although the fossil record has yet to reveal every chapter of the frogfish story, the living animals offer a marvellous glimpse of what millions of years of adaptation can produce.

Some fishes evolved for speed. Others for long-distance migration.

The frogfish evolved to look like a sponge, wave a fishing rod and swallow dinner whole.

And somehow, that seems like a perfectly respectable life choice. 

There are extraordinary stories waiting beneath the waves, beneath our feet and within the ancient rocks that preserve our planet's remarkable history.

Speaking of wonderfully unusual relatives, meet the red-lipped batfish, Ogcocephalus darwini, a Galápagos fish with scarlet lips, walking fins and a face that looks permanently unimpressed. 

Discover its extraordinary evolutionary story in our Fossil Huntress article, RED-LIPPED BATFISH: THE FISH THAT WALKED INTO A BEAUTY SALON.