256 fossilized titanosaur eggs have been found at 92 breeding grounds in India. The finds would reveal more about the lifestyles of some of the largest animals to ever inhabit our planet, researchers report in a study now published in the journal PLOS One.
The eggs were probably laid by titanosaurs that lived in the late Cretaceous. Among the eggs was one that contained the remains of a second egg, the scientists said. This indicates that the mighty sauropods could have reproduced in a similar way to modern birds, the scientists report in the journal “PLOS One.”
Eggs were buried by lava
Six different types of fossil eggs have been found in the Lameta Formation in central India. They date from the late Cretaceous period and were probably buried by lava during a volcanic eruption. While the fossilized eggs aren’t all from different dinosaur species, there is evidence that more titanosaurs may have lived in India than the three previously known species, they say.
“Together with the dinosaur nests in Jabalpur to the east and Balasinor to the west, the new nest sites in Madhya Pradesh province cover an east-west trajectory of about 1,000 kilometers,” said study team leader and co-author Guntupalli VR. Prasad. “This is one of the largest dinosaur breeding grounds in the world.”
Did titanosaurs form breeding colonies?
The arrangement of the nests found in India suggests that the titanosaurs hid their eggs in shallow pits, as crocodiles do today, the research team led by Harsha Dhiman of the University of New Delhi said in a broadcast. The animals likely formed breeding colonies, as is common in some bird species, the scientists say.
Extinct about 66 million years ago
The titanosaurs were a species- and form-rich group of so-called sauropod dinosaurs. They lived mainly during the Cretaceous Period, becoming the last group of sauropods to become extinct on the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary about 66 million years ago, along with all other non-avian dinosaurs. Fossils of these animals have been discovered on every continent.
The body plan of these herbivores, like that of all sauropods, is characterized by a barrel-shaped body, a long neck and a very small head relative to their size.
Source: Krone
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