Chapter 1: When did dinosaurs first dominate the Earth?
Of all the groups of animals who've ever lived, I'd say there's a fair argument that dinosaurs have been one of, if not the, mightiest to exist. And in their heyday, they established a rule that would go unchallenged for over 140 million years, leading to an entire era, the Mesozoic, being nicknamed the Age of Dinosaurs.
During this time, no other group of animals was able to come even close to challenging their dominion on land. And it was only after the referee stepped in 66 million years ago, in the form of a giant asteroid, that things finally changed. Now, the asteroid's impact was catastrophic for all life, killing 75% or more of all species.
But dinosaurs were especially affected thanks to their large sizes, and within a short amount of time, all non-avian dinosaurs had vanished from the face of the planet.
Chapter 2: What catastrophic event led to the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs?
But this wasn't really the end for the terrible lizards, as one group managed to slip by into the Cenozoic and are still all around us.
Chapter 3: How did avian dinosaurs survive the mass extinction?
The avian dinosaurs, aka birds. This group of familiar animals are indeed 100% dinosaurs, and specifically belong to the theropod clade, the same to which the T. rex once belonged to. and today they are found throughout the world and are represented by over 10,000 living species, which is no doubt very impressive.
Albeit, with that said, no living species of bird possesses the same imposing presence that the non-avian dinosaurs once possessed.
However, what some may not know is that, not long after the demise of the non-avian dinosaurs, there was actually a family of carnivorous theropods that sprung up, which ended up coming alarmingly close to being just as terrifying as their predecessors, and who were the dinosaur's strongest comeback attempt to date.
And this menacing group of avian dinosaurs primarily resided within South America, and would go on to create a powerful dynasty that lasted for tens of millions of years. And these were the Forest Rackids.
And maybe this name doesn't mean anything to you, but their nickname might, as over the years they have more often been referred to as the Terror Birds, as along with being flightless avian dinosaurs, they were, well, quite terrifying.
and each and every member seems to have come equipped with the same starter kit, and that is a relatively giant hooked beak, a tall vertical stance, powerful necks, and razor-sharp talons on the end of their feet.
It also helped their case that not one, but multiple species from this family managed to reach absolutely massive sizes for a carnivorous bird, with a few of them even becoming some of the largest Cenozoic predators who have ever graced South America, as well as taking the top spots when it comes to predatorial birds.
Yet, while everyone likes to focus on the glory days, so to speak, the pterobirds had humble beginnings and did not start off as giants.
Their fossil record is incomplete, but it's believed that they descended from a group of birds capable of flight who survived the K-T extinction event and ultimately became flightless in order to fill a new niche, with the first potential pterobird, the Palaeocelopterus, popping up as far back as 53 million years ago during the early Eocene, when the Earth was still very hot and Brazil was enduring heavy rainfall.
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Chapter 4: What were the Terror Birds and where did they originate?
However, even with this in mind, at the end of the day, this mystery bird is still considered to have been an apex predator, in the fact that it had no often-recurring natural predators. And surely the vast majority of animals around it, at least on land, feared it, rather than it fearing them.
And I point this out because, for a long time, it was actually thought that large terror birds were a bit like chihuahuas, in that they were all bark and no bite, being instead small prey specialists. hunting primitive rodents, reptiles, and smaller mammals instead of megafauna, given how their school is perceived as weak at the time.
But the latest research shows that terror birds are probably just fine at tackling small game and large game alike, with there being absolutely no problems. And this new, more supported idea stems from the discovery that in fact, two types of schools exist within the family members, generally speaking.
one being the Psilopterian skull type, and the other the Terrorbird skull type, the latter of which is only seen among the bigger members, and is mainly characterized by being more rigid.
And it's this rigidity that allows it to have much higher bite forces, higher stress tolerance, as well as giving it a bit more pecking power, and thus leading to the belief that these giant nightmares were capable of taking down prey larger than themselves.
And along with their more nightmarish physical traits, the Terrorbirds also evolved another advantage that assisted in their long reign, and that would be their senses. Their eyesight and hearing in particular were quite potent as shown by studies on their brain cases and skulls.
And regarding their eyesight, it is believed that, while they did not have as sharp vision as eagles or hawks, they still had, by all means, excellent vision, and possessed the crucial ability of being able to clearly see prey in both extremely bright areas and dark areas, allowing for a high level of adaptability.
Then for hearing, their inner ears were developed in such a way which suggests that terror birds were especially good at detecting low frequencies, which they then could have used to track and locate prey. Additionally, their hearing was in fact so sensitive that they could actually hear footsteps of small animals that were completely hidden by undergrowth.
And it is this fine-tuned sense of theirs which is currently believed to have been one of the main ways terror birds found prey. And so, hearing, eyesight, and all the other physical traits combined allowed the terebrates to become dominant predators for millions of years.
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