The vegetation took a toll on their teeth.
The researchers studied the specimens using CT scanning to see how their teeth were worn down as they fed, and how new teeth were added at the back in rows as the animal grew in size. The findings reveal that these early herbivores likely struggled to get enough nutrition in a day as the vegetation took a toll on their teeth. They eventually starved to death in old age.
Co-author of the study Thitiwoot Sethapanichsakul studied the jaws as part of his MSc in Palaeobiology. He said, “They were clearly eating really tough food such as ferns, that wore the teeth down to the bone of the jaw, meaning that they were basically chopping their meals by a mix of teeth and bone.”
After a certain age, their growth slowed down and the area of wear and tear just got deeper and deeper. Dr Rob Coram, co-author of the paper and also the one who discovered the Devon fossils, said, “It’s like elephants today – they have a fixed number of teeth that come into use from the back, and after the age of seventy or so they’re on their last tooth, and then that’s that.”
Professor Mike Benton from Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences said, “I first studied the rhynchosaurs years ago and I was amazed to find that in many cases they dominated their ecosystems. If you found one fossil, you found hundreds.” The team also compared examples of Devon rhynchosaurs with later examples from Scotland and Argentina. They were able to show how their dentitions evolved through time, and how their unique teeth enabled them to diversify twice, in the Middle and then in the Late Triassic, said theCoram said, “The fossils are rare, but occasionally individuals were entombed during river floods.
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