George Yates

There are lots of mammals i can think of that are extant today and predate the Holocene. Pangolin's, hedgehogs, lagiomorphs, whales (not to sure about balleen whales) and anteaters. Its a good question though, and i think quite a lot of the biggest megafauna died out then, like Indricotherium, but i dont think the extinction event can have been that severe, as it only appears as a minor setback when you look at it in the context of all developing mammal groups, which trimmed of only a few of the branches. I dont know much about how other groups were affected like reptiles, birds (which only diversified i imagine), fish and invertabrates. Afraid i cant find any figures or estimates

There are no truly marine species of marine amphibians alive today, but despite a lot of talk about how osmosis would dehydrate amphibians and draw water out of their bodies into the water, there was a group of Temnospondyl amphibians that adapted to a marine lifestyle. They were called Trematosauroidea, and lived during the triassic. they were medium sized amphibians (around 1 to 2 metres long) and evolved a rather crocodilian form, with a long snout, broad tail and wedge-shaped head. They died out towards the end of the triassic. There IS an extant species of frog that can tolerate salt water for a certain time, the crab-eating frog - although it prefers brackish water. Its tadpoles can remain in saltwater all the time.

Hi, this is George Yates who made the mistake of thinking this was a 'serious' and 'formal' science forum (oh well.) I like natural history (Mammals), paleoanthropology, radiation, weapons design and engineering, Biological weapons and zoology. Currently studying biology, geography and environmental studies at A-level.