The world鈥檚 oldest fossilised vomit has been uncovered near the English town of Peterborough.
But far from turning up their noses, palaeontologists are excited by the discovery of 鈥渃opious quantities鈥� of Jurassic puke, says Peter Doyle of the University of Greenwich. The regurgitations came from the mouths of ichthyosaurs swimming in the waters that covered England 160 million years ago and were found by Doyle in a clay quarry.
鈥淲e believe this is the first time the existence of fossil vomit on a grand scale has been proven beyond reasonable doubt,鈥� Doyle told 快猫短视频.
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鈥淚t shows ichthyosaurs behaved much as sperm whales do today,鈥� he says. The marine reptiles ate their fill of belemnites, a squid-like shellfish, before vomiting the indigestible bullet-shaped shells. Modern sperm whales regurgitate the gristly beaks of squid.
鈥淚 have been confused for a while that we found the arm hooks of belemnites in ichthyosaur stomachs, but not their shells. But vomiting explains it,鈥� he adds.
Acid etching
The evidence that the belemnite pile had once been eaten by the ichthyosaurs is that, when examined under a microscope, the calcium carbonate shells show distinctive signs of being etched by the dinosaur鈥檚 acid digestive juices.
Doyle says that they are unlikely to have been excreted in the usual way because the sharp shells would have inflicted terrible damage to the animal鈥檚 intestines.
In the Jurassic, the Peterborough clays were a shallow-water coastal feeding ground where belemnites thrived and ichthyosaurs came for a slap-up feed, before in turn being eaten by pliosaurs, says Dave Martill, a palaeontologist of the University of Portsmouth.
鈥淒oyle鈥檚 finding is very interesting, and I think his conclusions will be proved right,鈥� says Martill. 鈥淲e know that ichthyosaurs ate belemnites. And if they ate them whole, they would have got horrendous indigestion.鈥�