Feb. 3, 2010 A 60-million-year-old relative of crocodiles
described recently by University of Florida researchers in the
Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology was likely a food source for
Titanoboa, the largest snake the world has ever known. Working
with scientists from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
in Panama, paleontologists from the Florida Museum of Natural
History on the UF campus found fossils of the new species of
ancient crocodile in the Cerrejon Formation in northern
Colombia. The site, one of the world's largest open-pit coal
mines, also yielded skeletons of the giant, boa constrictor-like
Titanoboa, which measured up to 45 feet long. The study is the
first report of a fossil crocodyliform from the same site.
"We're starting to flesh out the fauna that we have from there,"
said lead author Alex Hastings, a graduate student at the
Florida Museum and UF's department of geological sciences.
Specimens used in the study show the new species, named
Cerrejonisuchus improcerus, grew only 6 to 7 f