PancakeCroc, BoarCroc And RatCroc: New Species Of Crocodile Cousins Discovered (PHOTOS)

Paleontologists have discovered 3 new species of crocodile cousins in the Sahara, which have been nicknamed PancakeCroc, BoarCroc, and RatCroc, along with new skeletons of the previously identified DogCroc and DuckCroc.

Paleontologists have been looking in the region since 2000 for what they term a "lost world" of crocodile ancestors -- which they believe were evolutionary "oddballs" and even ate dinosaurs.

Check out these amazing photo recreations from our friends at National Geographic.

Captions by National Geographic Staff Editor Christine Dell'Amore.

RatCroc

Bones from a menagerie of ancient crocodile cousins, including the rodent-like RatCroc, have been discovered beneath the windswept dunes of the Sahara.

The snub-nosed RatCroc, which had buckteeth for rooting through the ground after tubers or simple animals, is among five early crocodile cousins that ruled Gondwana--a landmass that later broke up into the southern continents--about a hundred million years ago, archaeologists say.



"There's an entire croc world brewing in Africa that we really had only an inkling about before," said Paul Sereno, a paleontologist at the University of Chicago and leader of a new study published today in the journal ZooKeys.

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