|
Sea Monsters A Prehistoric Adventure
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[Woman] The National Science Foundation, |
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[Man Narrating] |
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lie other worlds... |
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hidden from sight... |
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lost in time. |
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But sometimes we can |
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through remnants of the past. |
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We definitely got a skull. |
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It's hard to say. |
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[Narrator] This story begins |
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Depositional environment? |
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A team of paleontologists will try |
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and what world they came from. |
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So we got a time frame. |
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[Narrator] |
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mostly farmland today. |
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But once, Kansas lay |
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It was 82 million years ago... |
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during the age of the dinosaurs. |
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[Roaring] |
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But there was another world |
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a submerged world... |
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where enormous reptiles ruled seas |
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These... |
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were the most dangerous seas |
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No living thing was safe. |
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The great marine reptiles |
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and time has buried their world. |
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But any of us might still |
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- [Dog Whining] |
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[Whining Continues] |
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[Whining Continues] |
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[Narrator] As if from nowhere, |
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The scientists hope to find not just |
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but a story recorded in its bones. |
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Grab your tools. |
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Rain washed some of the chalk away |
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This is great. |
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[Narrator] |
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a rare Dolichorhynchops- |
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a dolly, for short. |
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It was a marine reptile |
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a little bigger than a dolphin... |
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and a fast swimmer. |
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To unravel any story |
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the investigators will draw on |
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Yeah, it looks like Hesperornis. |
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[Narrator] Their fossils have been found |
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It could have been over 30 feet long. |
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The matrix materials we've got in the lab |
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[Narrator] These finds will help the team |
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and picture the moment in time |
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In many ways, the dolly's world |
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The climate was warmer. |
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Sea levels were higher, |
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This dolly would have lived |
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that cut North America in two. |
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Marine reptiles were also found |
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which was a scattering of islands... |
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and throughout the world's oceans. |
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In time they died out... |
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and sea levels retreated... |
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exposing vast areas of seabed. |
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Fossils from the ancient oceans |
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A discovery in the Australian outback... |
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offers clues to how the dolly's life |
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It seems to be laying out in |
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95% of the fossils we're finding here |
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[Narrator] |
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suggests that marine reptiles |
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And in North America, |
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begins to unfold. |
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Imagine that one of |
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is a pregnant Dolichorhynchops. |
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She gives birth to a male... |
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18 inches long |
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and a female... |
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darker in color |
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And it's her life we begin to follow. |
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She and her brother |
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Instinct tells them what they have to do |
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From the beginning... |
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the little female and her brother practice |
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when they'll have to leave the safety of the shallows |
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If she survives the perils to come... |
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she'll return here one day |
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Already she finds |
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There's the Hesperornis... |
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a bird that can't fly |
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And the Styxosaurus... |
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a distant cousin of the dolly's... |
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with a supersized neck. |
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An adult can reach 35 feet in length... |
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more than half of it neck. |
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Its shape makes it |
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but it's great for catching fish. |
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The little dolly soon comes across |
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by pumping jets of water |
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They're called ammonites... |
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and they thrive in the ancient sea. |
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They have rock-hard armor |
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Swim too close, |
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and get a face full of ink. |
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But that doesn't stop |
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when it wants a snack. |
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Ammonites were once abundant. |
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Their fossils have been uncovered often... |
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even by a road crew in Texas. |
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Ammonites. |
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Ammonites. |
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[Narrator] |
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and we know |
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so their fossils are like markers in time. |
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Identify an ammonite and you can date |
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That helps place dollies |
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It began some 250 million years ago... |
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in the Triassic period... |
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with land reptiles |
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They developed webbed feet, |
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Some had elaborate armor. |
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Into the Jurassic, |
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To see at great depths... |
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some had eyes |
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top predators |
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reaching their peak |
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near the end of the dinosaur age... |
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the very time |
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Months have passed. |
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The female and her brother |
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but they're still |
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and unaware of the huge predators |
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For now, they are mastering the art |
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herring-like fish called Enchodus. |
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Then one day, everything |
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Perhaps it's a change of seasons... |
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that causes the Enchodus |
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The dollies must follow |
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And that means the young female |
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must now set out |
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trailing their mother |
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out into the Western Interior Sea. |
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It's about the size |
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and only a few hundred feet deep... |
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but somewhere ahead |
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We know because... |
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where those predators once swam... |
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the layered earth holds their remains... |
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as if a vast graveyard. |
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Exposed to wind and rain... |
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it gradually reveals what's within. |
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A remarkable discovery was made |
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pioneering fossil collectors |
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I covered it so nobody else |
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Ah. Yeah. |
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Skull looks like some kind of tylosaur. |
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Levi, be sure to look over there. |
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[Narrator] |
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the dollies might encounter |
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waters filled with dangers. |
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The Tusoteuthis was a massive hunter... |
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like the giant squid of today... |
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up to 30 feet long |
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It was too big to be attacked |
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who settles for smaller prey. |
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Platecarpus itself was fierce... |
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but not in the same league |
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the creature the Sternbergs had found. |
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Few ocean predators ever would compare |
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Think I've got some tail vertebrae |
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Could be lower limb bones. |
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Skull here. |
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Tail vertebra over there. |
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This fella could be giant-sized. |
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[Narrator] |
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a great reptile called Tylosaurus... |
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one of the largest and most ferocious |
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A fossil of a closely related beast |
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[Speaking Hebrew] |
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Its eyes were as big as grapefruits. |
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Cone-shaped teeth filled its jaws... |
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and the roof of its mouth |
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The tylosaurs were out there... |
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but there were other predators |
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As fish go, Xiphactinus was gigantic... |
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up to 17 feet long. |
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More than twice the size |
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it was a hunter |
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and this day one did. |
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## [Radio: Country] |
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We know what happened from a fossil |
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by Charles Sternberg's son George. |
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Mr. Sternberg? |
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I called from the newspaper. |
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There's a lot of talk about |
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- Glad you could come. |
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- Caught a pretty big fish here. |
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This is a 13-foot Xiphactinus. |
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As I went through |
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I noticed something beneath the ribs. |
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I found some vertebrae, |
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Turned out to be |
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The victim was a six-foot fish |
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such a mouthful that swallowing it |
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a prehistoric victim of gluttony. |
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[Water Splashing] |
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Weeks pass, and the dollies |
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venturing into a sea |
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Microscopic plankton |
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Under cover of darkness, |
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not quite sleeping. |
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Below, there's a mass spawning |
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The dollies keep their eyes |
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And one is about |
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[Man] |
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[Narrator] |
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two amateur collectors |
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So many have been found |
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that it's clear sharks were thriving |
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The Cretoxyrhina |
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as the Great White of our day. |
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It slices its victims into bite-size chunks, |
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[Whirring, Clicking] |
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[Speaking Dutch] |
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[Narrator] |
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that ancient sharks fed |
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leaving tooth marks on their bones. |
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The female and her brother |
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But it's their mother |
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[Squealing] |
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Their mother is gone, |
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A smaller shark |
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She's wounded... |
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but she survives the initial charge. |
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Perhaps the shark was not as lucky. |
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Her injury will heal... |
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though she'll always carry a shark's tooth |
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The two youngsters |
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If the female and her brother |
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they'll have to find food |
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in this vast inland sea. |
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Finally, they see something familiar- |
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a school of Enchodus |
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and by the flightless Hesperornis. |
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[Squawks] |
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But nearly anything in the sea- |
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can be a meal for a tylosaur. |
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[Man] |
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Yeah, it looks like a, uh' Hesperornis. |
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Big as a pelican. |
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[Narrator] |
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reveal its enormous appetite. |
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This looks like the bone |
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Got a bone here |
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Probably the size of an alligator. |
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And it seems like |
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Big eater, this guy. |
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[Narrator] |
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The female's flipper is slowly healing... |
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the embedded tooth |
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The young female is drawn away |
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One escapes among |
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prehistoric relatives of sea stars- |
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perhaps swept up from the bottom |
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The female has put herself |
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Taking the exposed parts |
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skull to tail- I make the specimen |
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Yeah. |
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There's something in the stomach. |
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[Narrator] |
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entombed within its ribs. |
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Because dollies are fast... |
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a tylosaur's best bet |
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[Hissing, Roaring] |
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The female escapes. |
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But her brother doesn't see |
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The Sternbergs had discovered |
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of two ancient lives intersecting. |
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But why did the predator die |
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Tylosaurs were likely territorial and aggressive, |
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Perhaps an older tylosaur |
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The younger tylosaur |
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slowed down by the large meal |
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The female dolly is forgotten. |
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[Bones Snap] |
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The younger tylosaur is mortally wounded. |
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But his story isn't over. |
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His final fate was recorded in stone. |
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A shark's tooth lay near the fossil. |
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Look at this. |
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The female moves on with the others. |
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Soon the scavenging will begin. |
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The young dolly has seen |
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but she survived. |
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Each year, |
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in the birthing grounds |
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Among them is the dolly |
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now fully grown. |
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She's completed her journey |
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And after several seasons, |
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Her young will grow |
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and, one day, set out on their own journey |
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Day by day, month by month... |
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life plays out. |
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She sees several litters |
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and depart on lives of their own. |
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Eventually, a year comes |
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One quiet day... |
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when old age has weakened her body... |
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her life comes to a gentle end. |
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Millions of years' worth |
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as she lies undisturbed. |
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Sea levels rise and fall. |
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Around the world, continents shift... |
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and volcanic activity |
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New species appear, |
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including the last |
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Beneath the shifting land, |
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are turned by time into rock. |
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[Girl] |
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- And lie hidden until exposed. |
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This time, by a summer rain. |
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[Woman Chattering] |
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[Man] |
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[Woman] |
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We may have to plaster the whole thing |
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[Woman] |
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[Narrator] There was something unusual |
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a shark's tooth |
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After 82 million years... |
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the female Dolichorhynchops |
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There are countless other creatures still buried |
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waiting for us to find them... |
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waiting to tell us stories |
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## [Woman Vocalizing] |
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# Looking for clues, traces and signs # |
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# Scraping away the dirt |
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# Oh, yes, a long time # |
| 00:37:02 |
# Digging out the mud that conceals # |
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# Take it away and it reveals # |
| 00:37:09 |
# Hidden stories, hidden lives # |
| 00:37:13 |
# Hidden stories |
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[Man] |
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# We're digging at the mud # |
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# These are the fragments |
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# We're digging out of the mud # |
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## [Vocalizing] |
| 00:37:37 |
# Opening stories of a different life # |
| 00:37:50 |
# Beneath the surface the unknown lies # |
| 00:37:53 |
# Stripping away the mark |
| 00:37:59 |
# Oh, the mark and scars of time # |
| 00:38:05 |
# Scraping away what layers remain # |
| 00:38:09 |
# To touch the level that contains # |
| 00:38:12 |
# Different stories, different lives # |
| 00:38:16 |
# Different stories |
| 00:38:21 |
# These are the marks and scars of time # |
| 00:38:25 |
# We're digging at the mud # |
| 00:38:29 |
# These are the fragments |
| 00:38:33 |
# We're digging out of the mud # |
| 00:38:37 |
## [Vocalizing] |
| 00:38:40 |
# Opening stories of a different life # |
| 00:38:45 |
# These are the marks and scars of time # |
| 00:38:48 |
# We're digging at the mud # |
| 00:38:52 |
# These are the fragments |
| 00:38:56 |
# We're digging out of the mud # |
| 00:39:00 |
## [Vocalizing] |
| 00:39:04 |
# Opening stories of a different life # |
| 00:39:12 |
# Of a different life ## |
| 00:39:27 |
## [Fades Out] |
