A Handful Of Cenozoic Critters (Patreon)

I'm currently in the research/writing stage for the next Earth Before Us, which will be all about the Cenozoic, so this month we've got a whole chunk of Cenozoic beasts. The Cenozoic era stretches from the time of the dinosaurs to present day, and gave rise to all the beautiful animals we now share the world with!

First up is Daeodon, which lived in North America during the late Oligocene, which is the last epoch in the Paleogene period of the Cenozoic era (periods are like Triassic, Jurassic, and so on, and each has their own subdivisions, which are seemingly endless). Daeodon was an entelodont, nicknamed the "hell pigs" because they have a lot of scary teeth and are built like trucks. However, they're more closely related to hippos and whales than to pigs (though all these animals are in the same group, the even-toed ungulates). They're also omnivores, like pigs, though that doesn't mean they'd be nicer than their carnivorous counterparts, as evidenced by the behavior of any pig. They long for the crunch of bone between their horrific teeth...

Entelodonts have no surviving descendants, with Daeodon being perhaps the last of the line. That's probably for the best.

Next we have Pelagornis andersi, also from the late Oligocene of North America. It was a coastal bird, and an absolutely huge one, with perhaps the largest windspan of any flying bird at 20-24 feet. The previous record-holder, the giant vulture Argentavis, is still a cooler bird though imho, because vultures are the best and coolest. Pelagornis had a similar lifestyle to the albatross, spending most of its time gliding over the ocean, using its "teeth" to grab fish from the water. Birds don't have teeth, but it's not rare to find birds that have evolved tooth-esque structures, whether on their tongues or their beaks or both (check out penguin and goose mouths, very pointy!) They're protrusions of the beak itself, in this case helpful for catching squiggly fish. Or ripping open bags of chips left unguarded on the beach.

Pelagornis has no living descendents, despite its similarities to other seabirds. Seabirds just Look Like That.

And up next we meet Brontornis, a terror bird that was the top predator of what is now Argentina in the mid-Miocene, the epoch right after the Oligocene. The terror birds are a whole group of birds that evolved to be... basically exactly what dinosaurs used to be, minus teeth. They are very cool, and amazing. Terror birds, unfortunately, have no living descendants.

Lastly, we have Platybelodon from the late Miocene of Asia. As you can probably guess, they're cousins to elephants, and very dorky cousins at that. Dorky, but also magnificent. They used their lower jaw to scrape bark from trees, and somehow, that worked out for them. Love these long-faced fellows! They, like all the other strange creatures in this post, have no modern descendants.

And that's all for this month! Let me know if you have any requests for particular ancient beasts for next month's post-- I could finally do an ocean vertebrates edition, perhaps?

As always, thank you so much for your support! Y'all are incredible.

-Abby