Hyneria
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| Hyneria Fossil range: Late Devonian |
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| Hyneria lindae Thomson, 1968 |
Hyneria was a prehistoric predatory lobe-finned fish that lived during the Devonian period around 360 million years ago. It was approximately 4 meters in length[1] and weighed as much as two tons. It also had powerful jaws and sharp teeth, and could swim fast, making it a deadly predator. There is also evidence from bones that it had very strong fins and maybe could go onto land. It used keen eyesight and an acute sense of smell to detect prey, such as large fish and even primitive amphibians, such as Hynerpeton. Victims would be caught in its jaws and then, while still alive, swallowed head first.
In 1968, fossilized teeth, bones and a tail fin were found by Keith Thompson in the Red Hill Shale of Pennsylvania[2]. Many specimens have been found since then, although a complete skeleton has yet to be discovered. Hyneria was just one of many species of lobe-finned fish of the family Tristichopteridae, common in the Late Devonian period, along with its close relative Eusthenopteron, whose well-preserved fossils are common and so have been intensively studied by scientists for decades.
[edit] In popular culture
Hyneria was featured in the BBC's television series Walking With Monsters. It featured a beached female Hyneria attempting to catch prey by sliding along the muddy ground like a walrus to catch two Hynerpeton (with the narrator explaining that it could "attack like a killer whale after a seal"). This behavior is entirely speculative, based on the fact that the fish had powerful fleshy fins, like those of a coelacanth, that could possibly have enabled it to move short distances on land (though most modern researchers consider early tetrapods and their ancestors to have been mainly aquatic).
Science fiction TV show Farscape featured an amphibious alien race known as the Hynerians.
[edit] References
Haines, Tim, and Paul Chambers. The Complete Guide to Prehistoric Life. Pg. 32-33. Canada: Firefly Books Ltd., 2006.
[edit] External links
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