The Earth in Its Mesozoic Era

MESOZOI
The Mesozoic
Era is the 2nd
phase of Earth’s
major geological eras
during the
Phanerozoic Eon, the
current eon in the
geologic time scale.
- “meso-” = “middle life”
- the time of the dinosaurs.
- bridged the gap between older
animals, more primitive ones, and
modern complex animals, dubbed
"middle animals."
- began 252.2 million
years ago
- followed by the
conclusion of the
Paleozoic Era 66
million years ago, at
the dawn of the
Cenozoic Era.
- generally warm
- less difference
in temperature
between
equatorial and
polar latitudes
than there is
today.
The Mesozoic Era has three major divisions,
oldest to youngest…
TRIASSIC
PERIOD
- Occurred immediately
after Permian Mass
Extinction
- Reptiles are really
successful here (Age of
Reptiles)
- relatively cool
- seas became inhabited by
large marine reptiles (e.g.,
ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs)
- various modern reptiles
rose (turtles, crocodilians)
-Pangaea began to
rotate with different
plates rotating at
different directions
- tension caused rips
in the earth to occur
forming rift
valleys/rift basins that
developed between
North America and
Europe, and between
Africa and South
America
There was a huge shift in
diversity and dominance of life
on Earth.
Ferns: Dominant understory

plants
Gymnosperms: Most middle-
story plants
Development of cycads and

ginkgoes
Lycopods: Occurence of water

loving plants
Dicroidium
Coccolihtophores
Lycophytes
> spore-bearing vascular
plants
Equisetophytes & Ferns
Horsetails
> have jointed stems with
small and inconspicuous
leaves that appear as scales
Early carnivore dinosaurs (about 225 million years
ago) were small. They were only about three feet long.
The first mammals were small, shrew-like animals.

Turtles, frogs, salamanders, lizards, and insects lived
then.
Meanwhile, corals lived in the oceans.
fauna examples:
Eoraptors
Pisanosaurus
Lesothosaurus
Lystrosaurus
The end of the Triassic period more than 200 million
years ago was due to the acidification of the oceans,
leading to the death of marine and terrestrial species.
For 40,000 years, volcanic eruptions from the Central

Atlantic Magmatic Province (CAMP) released all
deadly gases such as CO2, SO2, and CH4, which
generally resulted to global warming. Conodonts,
archosaurs, crocodiles, and other land mammals went
extinct…
PE
Continents were still together forming Pangaea
(but starting to drift apart). Very hot and dry.
Pangea began to slowly break up into present-
day continents. The major extinction at the end
of the Triassic Period made dinosaurs abundant
during this time…
This era had warm/wet climate that
gave rise to lush vegetation.
Called “Age of Cycads,” due to the

increase of cycads and cycadeoids
Conifers
> have needle-like leaves
> seed plants that typically have a stout
and woody (ligneous) trunk
Williamsonia: extinct female seed cones

Dinosaurs ruled the Earth.
Larger and many different
kinds of dinosaurs appeared.
(some were herbivores)
Large reptiles that were not

dinosaurs flew in the skies
and were able to swim.
- the modern sharks and the
first birds appeared
fauna examples:
Diplodocus
Ankylosaurus
Ichthyosaurus
Pterosaurs
Archaeopteryx
the first bird!
The
extinction
- not as chaotic as the Triassic
one, or how the succeeding
period after it ended
(cretaceous).
- marked by Tithonian-early
Barremian Cool interval, (began
150 million years ago, still
Other scientists hypothesized
that volcanic activity led to
climate change, causing some
animals to have a lower
diversity.
Other hypothesis: there was a

change in the levels of solar
radiation (natural variation in
solar radiation), causing
another ice age.
CRETACEO
US PERIOD
This is the last period when dinosaurs
lived. Ended with mass extinction
around 66 million years ago. Warmer
than today’s climate. The first
flowering plant appeared here…
- bees start to appear
- More small kinds of mammals appeared
- Birds split into two main groups: those that
could fly and those that could not.
Became Extinct Survived

Marine animals, dinosaurs, Many birds, fish, reptiles,
Pterosaurs, Ichthyosaurus squid, sharks, some
mammals
First flowering plants
(Angiosperms)
Pachypteris
> large shrub forming a
mangrove-like thicket
along tidal rivers
Archaefructus
genus of aquatic
flowering plants
Though it’s not the
oldest flowering plant,
it remains vital since
specimens are
completely preserved
(roots, shoots, leaves,
flowers, and seeds)
Pachysepalosaurid
Ceratopsian
[1980] the American scientist
Luis Walter Alvarez
formulated the “asteroid
theory” : an asteroid roughly
7.5 miles across slammed into
the waters off of what is now
Yucatán Peninsula at 45,000
miles an hour— leaving a
crater, and leading to severe
global cooling, wildfires,
tsunamis.
The only lines of archosaurs—the group of reptiles
that contains the dinosaurs, birds, and crocodilians
that survived the extinction were the lineages that led
to modern birds and crocodilians.
Of the planktonic
marine flora and fauna,
only about 13% of the
coccolithophore and
planktonic foraminiferal
genera remained alive.
It [theory] gained skepticism among some
paleontologists, with agitating for terrestrial factors as
the cause of the extinction, and some claimed that a
huge outpouring of lava…
… known as the Deccan Traps,
occurred in India at the end of the
Cretaceous which caused carbon
dioxide production, and created a
global greenhouse effect that greatly
warmed the planet.
MAR
Y
the end!
(not exactly, geologically speaking)

The Earth in Its Mesozoic Era

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MESOZOI

Ferns: Dominant understory

Development of cycads and

Lycopods: Occurence of water

The first mammals were small, shrew-like animals.

For 40,000 years, volcanic eruptions from the Central

Called “Age of Cycads,” due to the

Williamsonia: extinct female seed cones

Large reptiles that were not

Other hypothesis: there was a

Became Extinct Survived

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