14 DAY TRIAL // They did not have any “What to Expect When You're Expecting” books in the Early Cretaceous, but as it turns out, the creatures that roamed the Earth during this period made excellent parents. Or at least this is what fossil records suggest.
Thus, a recent paper in the Geosciences Journal describes the fossilized remains of a family of aquatic reptiles that paleontologists estimate lived about 145 to 100 million years ago.
The fossils, featured in the photo below, were left behind by an adult philydrosaurus and six juvenile creatures belonging to the same species. Hence, paleontologists believe that they belong to a mom and its babies.
The mother philydrosaurus and its offspring appear to have all died at the exact same time and cuddled up together. This means that the adult reptile most likely died while looking after its babies, Live Science explain.
“That philydrosaurus shows parental care of the young after hatching suggests protection by the adult, presumably against predators,” the paleontologists who have had the chance to study the remains write in the Geoscience Journal.
Mind you, parental care was actually quite common in ancient times. Thus, researchers say that many crocodile- and bird-like species that lived eons ago invested quite a lot of time and effort in raising their young.
