Sebecosuchians: The Croc Cousins that competed with Theropods

[@Sawrattan]

It's strange that these animals are never mentioned in prehistory documentaries on TV. I always took for granted that after the dinosaurs, the only big carnivorous reptiles were snakes and lizards in the shadow of mammals, then it turns out South America was still ruled by giant archosaurs right up to relatively modern times.

[@melvinshine9841]

Dinosaurs will always be my #1, but I'd have loved to see these "panther crocs" walking around. It's always felt odd to me that fully terrestrial "crocodiles" are no longer a thing, but we have monitor lizards, kind of, copying their homework.

[@Sawrattan]

I had no idea these terrestrial 'panther crocs' were even a thing, I thought it was just lizards and snakes. From what I remember, prehistory documentaries always made it clear that mammals immediately took over the world when in fact we now learn they continued to live in terror of reptiles in South America and Australia.

[@gattycroc8073]

this is why I want a massive paleo project on South Amarica before the Great American Interchange. the sebecids, phorusrhacids, and sparassodonts are some of my favorite prehistoric predators and I would like to make appearance alongside the many types of meridiungulates and xenarthrans.

[@davidrichard3582]

Love it!

[@mastomasto6197]

@@indyreno2933 ótimas explicações, obrigado. Aqui do Brasil .

[@1998topornik]

My favourite clade of crocodylomorphs! They succesfully competed with some dinosaurs, survive KPG mass extinction, became apex predators of South America and probably the largest land predators of cenozoic era. They are amazing.

[@gattycroc8073]

the sebecids and baurusuchids are verry underrated in terms of paleoart and pop culture.

[@bkjeong4302]

So much for the ideas of land crocs not being able to compete with dinosaurs or mammals. These guys dealt with both.

[@robwalsh9843]

The idea of a land crocodile stalking prey just as quietly as a water crocodile is plausible and unsettling.

[@Tsotha]

it's more the unsettling, it's outright terrifying - crocodiles much bigger than any currently extant species who can move much faster

[@gamdanyunizar7849]

This is exactly what I need, I need some inspiration to create a fictional creature and I stumbled upon your amazing channel, subbed!

[@vladimirlagos2688]

An awesome video as usual. It is wild to see how varied and exciting were the lives of extinct crocodilian relatives when compared to the fairly boring and fairly equal life strategy of the surviving members of the group.

[@DragonwolfoftheSands]

It's not a boring strategy you're just conditioned to view it that way because you've been seeing and hearing about them all your life. Crocodilians are loving jump scares that live their lives as horror movie monsters and they're so good at it that they've been doing it for longer than the world has had flowers

[@vladimirlagos2688]

@@DragonwolfoftheSands I think you are missing my point though. I've seen crocs in the wild, they are scary creatures indeed. The boring aspect is that all species of extant crocs use essentially the same general water ambush strategy with very minor variations. Compared to their extinct relatives among which one can list pursuit predators, filter feeders, terrestrial ambush predators, open ocean predators, herbivores, digger omnivores, bipedal predators, and even arboreal predators among other things... well, I hope you can see now were I was going with my initial comment.

[@daniell1483]

The more I learn about these crocodilian cousins, especially the terrestrial examples, the more they look like fantasy minor dragons to my mind. D&D calls such minor dragons "drakes" and the similarities are striking. So much so, I wonder if the creators of D&D had some knowledge of these prehistoric animals and based their dragon designs on them? Or is it perhaps just a coincidence? Hard to say but I absolutely love learning about these animals either way. It is hard to imagine seeing these guys in the wild. And yet, we have millions of years of proof that they absolutely existed. Amazing.

[@golddragonette7795]

I suspect they just wanted an easier CR without making it a Young Green Dragon etc The monster manual has a lot of humanoids if they knew much about palaeontology

[@tozarkt9805]

Brilliant video as always, it always impresses me how diverse pseudosuchians are! Also, may I request a future video on cenozoic avifauna, such as lithornithids? I feel they’re a very underrated group!

[@dr.polaris6423]

That’s a great idea! I’ve been thinking about covering the early Paleognaths and animals like Bathyornis for a while now.

[@blackraptorex2469]

Awesome video that you made! They are truly are successors to the Mesozoic crocs and the fact that one of them is the largest terrestrial predator in the entire Cenozoic era is incredible. Btw can you someday talk about phorusrhacos because they are literally my favorites.

[@chimerasuchus]

Great video! Notosuchians really don't get enough attention. One small nitpick though. At 6:38, that is not Bergisuchus but Boverisuchus. Boverisuchus was a planocraniide, which were crocodilians (or very close relatives) who returned to a terrestrial existence.

[@iamleoooo]

I love how this channel grows over time :)

[@catfishcain]

Brilliantly done as always

[@prizrenbucpapaj869]

Great one! Can't wait for the next paleo art themed video!

[@KTo288]

Glancing at the thumbnail I missed the dead prey on the ground, I mistakenly thought this video was aboutma hippo like crocodiliform. Everyone likes the carnivores, but the crocodiliforms that evolved to become herbivores deserve some love too.

[@seabass1872]

It'd be cool to see these guys in documentaries

[@bumbleguppy]

Sometimes I have to consider that among the traits humans possess to succeed as a species, the lack of huge, fast land crocodiles is probably not recognized as a lucky trait the way it should be.

[@bkjeong4302]

Mekosuchines say hi.

[@etinarcadiaego7424]

But imagine if we somehow managed to tame them and humans rode into battle on these instead of horses!

[@akiraasmr3002]

Also a video on dinocephalians like anteosaurus and Titanosuchus would be great

[@thelaughinghyenas8465]

Thank you for the video. It was very interesting and informative.

[@dynamosaurusimperious2718]

This was absolutely amazing

[@justinthehedgehog3388]

Another great presentation.

[@M_11_m41n]

I watched a video on TierZoo on crocodiles. And I got to tick mark on my head when he said that crocodiles on land couldn't really be successful. EDIT: Don't get the wrong idea, his way of fusing nature education with gaming concept is absolutely brilliant and it can have some funny moments sometimes. But, there's a lot prehistoric groups of animals that he doesn't really know well and he needs to do more research.

[@peterszeug308]

That guy TierZoo has a decent sense of humour but sells biased speculations as educated guesses.

[@juanjoyaborja.3054]

And yet he completely ignores the fact that terrestrial pseudosuchians were never outcompeted. The Raiusuchians were actually the dominant terrestrial animals in the Triassic, and then Crocodyliforms like Razanandrogobe went extinct only because of climate change, and not out-competition. The sebecids too were never outcompeted in South America, only going extinct because of climate change. I like tier zoo, but remember, he hasn’t ever actually shown credentials in science. Whatever he shows on his videos isn’t completely factual.

[@chrisdonish]

Teirzoo is not scientific nor very smart, he is very opinionated and has biases that affect his rankings. I picked up on this on his ranking of birds and realized his bias against flightless birds. The clip where he showed a domestic chicken clumsily trying to fly from the fox made me wonder if he knew that humans bred flight out of chickens yet he used it to judge chickens as a species.

[@juanjoyaborja.3054]

@@chrisdonish He also forgot that the most dangerous bird on the planet happens to be a flightless bird too. He doesn’t realise that ratites aren’t weak at all, except for maybe the kiwi. Besides, the ostrich can swim, that makes it even better. And yeah, jungle fowls are much more aggressive than chickens, and can usually fly away from any ecounter.

[@kawawangkowboy9566]

To be fair, *crocodiles* aren't built for their current survival strategy to be successful on land. Pseudosuchians aren't crocodiles.

[@witchflowers6942]

i’m officially in love with these crocks

[@mufflerdad5048]

Awesome channel!! Loved your video on paleoart too

[@kuitaranheatmorus9932]

This video is really amazing and I love it

[@woogle7382]

>competed with some of the most dangerous predators on earth >survived extinction event only to become the largest cenozoic predator >dies of climate change and refuses to elaborate

[@raptorzilla0710]

sigma croc grindset

[@dragonfox2.058]

Can you imagine SEEING one of these things? NIGHTMARE

[@juanjoyaborja.3054]

I’d feed ancient Notosuchids, they’re like scaly cats, but nah, sebecids were nightmarish

[@stuartbruff8786]

Is there any indication of sebosuchian brain size and morphology? It would be interesting to know if being a land-based, upright hunter had any implications for the animal's intelligence. Ditto, any thermoregulation implications?

[@ProfLambeo_VT]

I feel so robbed...these are the closest we've ever been to having real dragons!

[@williamjordan5554]

Humans wouldn't have ever existed with these around.

[@yanaskhoir3657]

@@williamjordan5554 in cenozoic apes not even exist just squirel want solved how to eat pine fruits

[@milanistaultra3090]

@@yanaskhoir3657 ehm do you know, we are still in the cenozoic......

[@spacewarsfight281]

Reptiles are some of the strangest animals

[@joeshmoe8345]

Very interesting thanks for sharing

[@GarGhuul]

Another informative video! Thankyou. I do have to ask what the music of your intro is?

[@theprehistoricprofessor9076]

In the early Age of Mammals, giant reptiles still ruled South America, as they always haved!

[@williamjordan5554]

Not now.

[@partysaurulophussinclair7568]

Ironically, the ones in the thumbnail bare a resemblance to some of the first reconstructions of theropods.

[@denizen9998]

Cant wait for you to cover Knight and Burian in the paleoart series.

[@akiraasmr3002]

can you please do a video on Anteosaurus its an interesting predator I want to hear about.

[@ecurewitz]

Awesome, thank you!

[@Xarl-VIII]

That croc will forever haunt my dreams.

[@harvestcanada]

I would not want to meet this spieces on a wet dark night. The sound lethal.

[@PlainsPup]

Interesting that they all seem to have that upward pointing fang in the lower jaw, almost like the opposite of the downward pointing sabers and tusks so common in mammals.

[@bo7341]

I know it's probably a niche market, but can we get an Early Cenozoic Park? Put some larger sebecids, titanoboa, gastornis and Andrewsarchus together on an island and watch the fireworks.

[@CJ-BZ]

wow south america was literally a “what if” continent before the interchange. Possibly weirder than even australia

[@gattycroc8073]

it's too bad that Walking with Beast and Prehistoric Park took place after the interchange. Maybe because they wanted to show Smilodon or something. Hopefully there's a paleo project on South Amarica before the interchange.

[@skaarfistpunchington3740]

Wait wait wait wait.... why does that Straitiosuchus (4:27) have a mustache?

[@brandonhorlback5786]

How do we know if they’re the same animals in different places?

[@cyankirkpatrick5194]

I've been seeing the teaser for prehistoric planet narrated by Sir Attenborough and why didn't they get you instead? Looks interesting though I nearly fell out of my seat when I seen T Rex swimming 🤯🤯 that was my thoughts on that not one show has ever mentioned that.

[@jackstraw4222]

theres old illustrations in books of t rex swimming back in the early 1990s

[@cyankirkpatrick5194]

@@jackstraw4222 As a kid we were never shown this,I'm talking in the 70's, so glad they have changed the attitude of all dinosaurs.

[@catherinehubbard1167]

Really neat animals, but I wouldn’t want to meet one. Those teeth! And it looks like they could run. Amazing that they lasted so long, competing with - and eating - dinosaurs, surviving the K/Pg extinction, and continuing to terrorize mammals until 12-13 and even maybe even as little as 5 million years ago. Compared to dinosaurs, that’s yesterday.

[@yanaskhoir3657]

Sebecids like back to permian even variant like Banasuchus made even Postosuchus proud another archos take Apex throne agains in Cenozoics

[@robrice7246]

12:35 Basically in South America, dinosaurs (and their relatives) still rule.

[@gattycroc8073]

and the sparassodonts as the small to medium sized predators.

[@williamjordan5554]

No. Bipedal apes rule.

[@KreeTerry]

So I understand the nostrils moving up the snout for creatures who spend a lot of time at the surface of water but I don’t get why most terrestrial animals have nostrils at the front/tip of the snout. Could someone more educated than I maybe help me out? Either way such an awesome video, just reminds me how so many animals we have today have much more storied history we can ever fully appreciate.

[@southron_d1349]

Terrestrial animals' pick up scents blowing on the air currents into their faces. There's a kind of stereo effect to determine where the smells are coming from. Some animals nose around in leaf litter to pick up the smells of their food. A good example is the Kiwi which has its nostrils at the end of the bill which it pokes into sand and soil to smell its tiny prey. Nostrils on the top of the head makes it hard to do and aquatic animals are less concerned about scents.

[@KreeTerry]

@@southron_d1349 oh yea that makes sense (ha). Thanks!

[@JackieOwl94]

I swear, these middle-European land-crocs are the skulls that inspired European dragon legends. Just put wings on that thing, and you have a dragon from European mythology. People from ages ago likely found at least a skull or something and thought “dragon!”

[@granolapancake]

Ah yes, this will make a fine addition to my (intellectual) collection.

[@TedShatner10]

So basically the last gasps of dinosaur (terror birds) and dinosaur like apex predators mainly in South America after the KT impact?

[@raghaviyer3065]

Mesozoic South America was weird

[@dr.polaris6423]

It sure was!

[@TheMrPeteChannel]

So these guys survived the KT extinction. I guess it was the ice ages that finally killed them off?

[@HassanMohamed-jy4kk]

Why don’t you also make a suggestion creating a another KZbin Video Amphicyons (Bear Dogs) next month in the beginning or in the middle of May coming up soon?!⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️👍👍👍👍👍

[@anotherrandomtexan25]

The left most bird on the thumbnail looks like a diplodocus floating in the air lol

[@janetfranck1797]

Wow a prehistoric crocodile that spends it,s life out of water, That,s so. Cool 😮😃

[@horsetuna]

Moment I heard the name I expected the Shrek reference

[@thediplomaticentertainer1785]

These things straight up don't even seem real. Like I can't believe these were actually running around South America back then, like they look like something out of D&D. Actual "Lake Placid" meets "The Ghost and the Darkness" type shit.

[@mikewilson858]

Given that these are terrestrial animals isn’t it likely they would have lips to keep the teeth from drying out?

[@storytimewithunclekumaran5004]

I can't believe your expertise in your disciplines .. I am generally pretty bright..but you make me feel like I know nothing..

[@Emotio55]

Ur right arctotherium was bigger but still croc is scary

[@edwardfletcher7790]

Interesting that the thumbnail has so many modern birds in it....

[@donkeykong6426]

could they survive modern day??

[@beastmaster0934]

South America before the GABI was still ruled over by archosaurs.

[@themarquess]

Any theories on why members of this group survived the K-Pg extinction, while similarly sized non avian dinosaurs did not?

[@gattycroc8073]

the members that survived K-Pg extinction were smaller in size to the other sebecosuchians. only growing as the Cenozoic progressed.

[@juanjoyaborja.3054]

Non-avian dinosaurs likely had a very long gestation period, hence why their population couldn’t recover as quickly. Also, Notosuchids were very small at the time of the K-Pg mass extinction, filling a niche not too different from that of a small wildcat. They reached larger sizes much later.

[@jasminegobuster3847]

question: why does bird are considered as theropod dinosaur if all theropod are carnivores while some bird are omnivores or herbivores?

[@dr.polaris6423]

Many Theropod dinosaurs were omnivores and even herbivores. The most ancient relatives of birds were toothy insectivores such as Archaeopteryx, with the massive diversity of modern birds only appearing much later.

[@ExtremeMadnessX]

Therizinosaurus, oviraptors and ornithomimus were also mostly omnivores or herbivores.

[@KRhetor]

Real-life rhedosaurs.

[@cyankirkpatrick5194]

I'm glad there not around anymore whew

[@barbararice6650]

Why a large dog and not a small pony 😕

[@tyrannotherium7873]

oh so tyrannosaurs rex does not have lips but Sebecosuchians have them that makes not sense therapod dinosaurs did not have lips

[@raptorzilla0710]

yes they did? wdym

[@raphlvlogs271]

they probably had stripped or spotted skin in order to blend in the environment

[@gergopiroska5749]

Why tf all of the intresting animals died off but we got the less intresting (although i still like extant animals) ones roaming around

[@Drkon6]

They're only less interesting because we're used to them, if we evolved several million years later and didn't have live elephants, giraffes, and polar bears around, we'd say the same thing about them.

[@drowjack]

Dog Crocs are cool