Lycaenops - Wiki Lycaenops
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Order: Therapsida
Suborder: Gorgonopsia
Family: Gorgonopsidae
Species:
- Lycaenops angusticeps
- Lycaenops ornatus
- Lycaenops kingwilli
Fossil range: late Middle Permian to early Late Permian
[Photo] Restoration of Lycaenops (English: Lycaenops, a gorgonopsid from the Upper Permian of South Africa, pencil drawing; Deutsch: Lycaenops, ein Gorgonopside aus dem Oberperm von S??dafrika, Stiftzeichnung). Date: May 7, 2007. Author: Arthur Weasley (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:ArthurWeasley).
Copyright (C) 2007 Arthur Weasley Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License". |
Lycaenops ("
Wolf-Face") is a genus of carnivorous therapsid (
mammal-like "
reptile"). It measured about 1 meter (3 feet) long and lived during the late mid-Permian to the early Late Permian in what is now South Africa. Like the modern-day
wolves from which it takes its name,
Lycaenops bore a long and slender skull, with a set of
dog-like fangs set into both its upper and lower jaws. These pointed canine teeth were ideal for the use of stabbing and/or tearing at the flesh of any large prey that it came upon. This species most likely hunted small vertebrates such as
reptiles, small pelycosaurs, and dicynodonts such as Robertia and Cistecephalus, as well as larger dicynodonts.
Lycaenops walked and ran with its long legs held close to its body. This is a feature found in
mammals, but not in more primitive amniotes and synapsids, such as the pelycosaurs and early
reptiles whose legs are positioned to the sides of their bodies. The ability to move like a
mammal would have given
Lycaenops an advantage over other land vertebrates, since it would have been able to out-run them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LycaenopsThe text in this page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article shown in above URL. It is used under the GNU Free Documentation License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the GFDL. |