Take a walk along the waterways of the Late Triassic, and you could easily think it was a world full of crocodiles! But in fact, those are not crocs, but phytosaurs, a group of predatory reptiles that represent not only one of the oldest groups of carnivorous reptiles to achieve a near-global distribution, but also one of evolution's most famous cases of convergent evolution. So, what features did phytosaurs share with crocs? Where did they differ? And just how croc-like were their lifestyles? Listen in and find out!

In the news: dinosaur belly buttons, tiny frogs, snake venom, and giant dwarf crocs.

Time markers:

IT’S CROC MONTH! Check out our Croc Month activities on our social media, Discord, and Patreon!

We recently made a guest appearance on Third Pod From the Sun, where we discussed the K-Pg mass extinction! https://thirdpodfromthesun.com/2022/06/10/extinctions-dinosaurs-a-big-rock-andclimate-change/

Check out our blog for bonus info and pictures:

Join us on Patreon to support the podcast and enjoy bonus content! https://www.patreon.com/commondescentpodcast 

Or make a one-time donation via PayPal: https://tinyurl.com/4c68u4hp

Find merch at the Common Descent Store! http://zazzle.com/common_descent

Join the Common Descent Discord server! https://discord.gg/CwPBxdh9Ev

Follow and Support us on:

You can email us at commondescentpodcast(at)gmail.com

The Intro and Outro music is “On the Origin of Species” by Protodome.

Musical Interludes are "Professor Umlaut" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0