Octopus Ancestors Lived Before Era Of Dinosaurs: Study
Huff PostLOADING ERROR LOADING WASHINGTON — Scientists have found the oldest known ancestor of octopuses – an approximately 330 million-year-old fossil unearthed in Montana. “It’s very rare to find soft tissue fossils, except in a few places,” said Mike Vecchione, a Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History zoologist who was not involved in the study. It pushes back the ancestry much farther than previously known.” The specimen was discovered in Montana’s Bear Gulch limestone formation and donated to the Royal Ontario Museum in Canada in 1988. The well-preserved fossil also “shows some evidence of an ink sac,” probably used to squirt out a dark liquid cloak to help to evade predators, just like modern octopuses, said Christopher Whalen, an American Museum of Natural History paleontologist and co-author of the study published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications.
History of this topic
Ten-armed squid thought to be 328 million years old named after Joe Biden
The Independent
Octopus ancestors lived before era of dinosaurs, study shows
Associated Press
Scientists find octopus ancestor that predates dinosaurs and name it after President Biden
LA Times
The Octopus' oldest relative is 128 million years old!
FirstpostDiscover Related