In the photo: Reconstruction.
In Colombia, fossilized remains of a giant snake have been discovered, which science has not yet seen. The length of the animal was 12.8 meters, and the weight was 1135 kilograms. A giant snake could easily swallow a victim the size of a cow, not to mention a person
The discovery was made by an international team of scientists led by paleontologist Jason Head from the University of Toronto (Canada). The spine and ribs of the snake were discovered in early 2007 in a coal mine in northeastern Colombia. The fossil animal was named Titanoboa cerrejonensis. Most likely, the snake was a close relative of the boa constrictor (Boa constrictor), which lives today in Central America and the Lesser Antilles.
According to Professor Jason Head of the University of Mississauga in Toronto (Canada), it is the largest snake that has ever existed on the planet, as well as the largest vertebrate that lived in the era after the extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago, reports "Compulent".
In addition to the remains of Titanoboa Cerrejonesis, scientists have discovered many fossil remains belonging to giant sea turtles and primitive crocodile species. “We believe the Titanoboa Cerrejonesis was completely water snake. From time to time, it crawled out onto land to warm up,”Head said, adding that mostly water snakes feed on other aquatic vertebrates. The basis of his diet was, most likely, the ancestors of modern crocodiles.
The vertebra of the found snake compared to the vertebra of the anaconda.
Scientists believe that the find will help to find out what the climate of the tropics was like in the distant past. The size of the fossilized bones suggests that in order to maintain the metabolism of such a giant snake, the average annual temperature in the tropics should not have dropped below 35 degrees Celsius. This assumption confirms the version that the temperature difference between the tropics of the Paleocene times and the regions at higher latitudes was the same as today. This contradicts the "thermostat" hypothesis that tropical temperatures could remain unchanged even if other regions got hotter.
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According to scientists, the tropical ecosystems of South America were very different from modern ones, which made the existence of huge snakes possible. “It was the same rainforest as it is today, but the temperatures were higher. Consequently, there could be reptiles that the world has never seen and I hope that it will never see again,”said Professor Jonathan Bloch from the University of Florida.