''Ulemosaurus'' is an extinct genus of

dinocephalia Dinocephalians (terrible heads) are a clade of large-bodied early therapsids that flourished in the Early and Middle Permian between 279.5 and 260 million years ago (Ma), but became extinct during the Capitanian mass extinction event. ...

n therapsids that lived 265 to 260 million years ago, at Isheevo in

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

Tatarstan Tatarstan, officially the Republic of Tatarstan, sometimes also called Tataria, is a Republics of Russia, republic of Russia located in Eastern Europe. It is a part of the Volga Federal District; and its capital city, capital and largest city i ...

. It was a tapinocephalid, a group of bulky herbivores which flourished in the Middle Permian. ''Ulemosaurus'' and other tapinocephalians disappeared at the end of the Middle Permian.

Description

Only several partial skeletons and skulls have been found. ''Ulemosaurus'' grew to 4-5 meters in length and weighed up to one ton.https://ar.culture.ru/en/subject/ulemozavr The skull bones are extremely dense: about at its thickest. This thickening is possibly related to head-butting behavior, as some researchers suggest. The species is considered a

herbivore A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically evolved to feed on plants, especially upon vascular tissues such as foliage, fruits or seeds, as the main component of its diet. These more broadly also encompass animals that eat ...

, but because the

mandible In jawed vertebrates, the mandible (from the Latin ''mandibula'', 'for chewing'), lower jaw, or jawbone is a bone that makes up the lowerand typically more mobilecomponent of the mouth (the upper jaw being known as the maxilla). The jawbone i ...

is heavily constructed some

palaeontologist Paleontology, also spelled as palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of the life of the past, mainly but not exclusively through the study of fossils. Paleontologists use fossils as a means to classify organisms, measure geolo ...

s consider it a

carnivore A carnivore , or meat-eater (Latin, ''caro'', genitive ''carnis'', meaning meat or "flesh" and ''vorare'' meaning "to devour"), is an animal or plant Plants are the eukaryotes that form the Kingdom (biology), kingdom Plantae; they ar ...

, with the species being able to use muscle power to cut prey up with its

incisor Incisors (from Latin ''incidere'', "to cut") are the front teeth present in most mammals. They are located in the premaxilla above and on the mandible below. Humans have a total of eight (two on each side, top and bottom). Opossums have 18, wher ...

Classification

''Ulemosaurus'' is a large '' Moschops''-like form from Russia; it is probably similar enough to be included as a separate species of ''Moschops''. Despite its advanced characteristics, it lived slightly before the Karoo forms, showing that the Moschopines, and indeed the Tapinocephalidae in general, had already attained their acme by early Capitanian time.

References

External links

Taxonomy
{{Taxonbar, from=Q241603 Tapinocephalia Prehistoric therapsid genera Guadalupian synapsids of Europe Extinct animals of Russia Fossil taxa described in 1938 Capitanian genus first appearances Capitanian genus extinctions Capitanian life

Description

Classification

See also

References

Further reading

External links