Henodus | 3D Dinopedia

Henodus

Period of life:

237-227 mya

Period:

Triassic period

Habitat:

Coasts

Taxonomy:

Marine reptiles

Height:

0.3 m

Countries:

Henodus (237-227 mya)

Henodus or "Turtle-faced monodont" is a placodont, the fossil remains of which were discovered only in the south-west of Germany in 1936, where in the Triassic period about 230 million years ago Henodus inhabited salt and fresh water bodies. The specimen found was about 1 meter long.

These creatures appeared in the sea long before the archenols and were representatives of placodonts, but with a shell that served as their protection against predators. However, unlike the turtle shell, their shell consisted of several hundred bony plates, tightly fitted to each other, like a mosaic. At the edges the shell narrowed forming a pair of flattened, but very strong flaps. Henodus had a blunt toothless mouth, and they fed on mollusks and other slow inhabitants of shallow waters. Their shell had a rectangular shape, and paws were short and thick, from which it can be concluded that he they moved mainly crawling along the seabed.

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