100-Million-Year-Old Fossil Preserves an Ichthyosaur That Ate a Pterosaur Before Becoming Food for a Giant Predator

Discover Magazine ^ | Updated August 4, 2026 | Monica Cull

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks to fossilized evidence from Richmond, Queensland, researchers found a marine reptile had eaten a flying reptile shortly before becoming a meal for a larger predator. This is some of the first fossilized evidence of its kind, according to a study in the journal Gondwana Research, and helps us better understand what happened beneath ancient waves over 100 million years ago...

Inside the fossilized belly of a 19- to 22-foot ichthyosaur -- a prehistoric dolphin-like marine reptile -- researchers uncovered something they'd never seen before. Thanks to advanced 3D imaging, the research team found pieces of a pterosaur, a flying reptile, inside the ichthyosaur's fossilized stomach contents.

According to the study, this is the first known evidence of an ichthyosaur consuming a pterosaur. But the ichthyosaur fossil revealed something else. On closer inspection, the ichthyosaur fossil -- which belonged to a Platypterygius australis -- contained huge bite marks, missing pieces, and shattered bones that are consistent with attacks, or perhaps scavenging, from Kronosaurus queenslandicus, a giant predator that ruled the ancient seas in this area.

[Apparatchik]

The original turducken.

[sphinx]

I took my daughter to see Jurassic Park in the theater when it came out. She was still theoretically much too young for it; she was still in the climb up and sit in my lap age if things got scary, though she would usually be in her own seat.

When the T-Rex ate the lawyer, she had a one word response: “More!” I knew she would turn out ok.

The only movie monster that ever phased her was Shelob. That was lap time. But nothing else in LOTR bothered her.

Oddly enough, she refuses to watch anything that she deems as “scary” today. I don’t understand her line of demarcation, but I think big hungry critters are ok, while anything psychologically twisted is not. I did get her to watch Tremors, which she liked.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

“More!” — LOL. I can just picture that!

[ridesthemiles]

YOU WIN POST OF THE DAY

[Sirius Lee]

Probably Mary Ann or Ginger.

I was thinking Eaty Gourmet.

[SunkenCiv]

Ptero Reed.

[Sirius Lee]

Nicely played.

[Taxman]

LOL!

A pre-historic pigturducken?

[jmacusa]

A peck of pickled Pterosaurs picked a peck of pickled professors...

[Bullish]

You know the old saying... “It’s an ichthyosaur, Pterosaur eat world.”

[scrabblehack]

So the pterosaur flew too low to the water and the ichthyosaur ate it? Maybe the pterosaur was going after a small fish and was eaten instead.

[Jim W N]

A peck of pickled Pterosaurs picked a peck of pickled professors...

That's funny...

[SunkenCiv]

😁

[null and void]

He ate the lawyer.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

He ate the lawyer.

And that proves they're really not so bad.

Jurassic Park is frightening after dark....

[Salamander]

Wins internet.

🏆🏆🏆

[Salamander]

😆

[Salamander]

And I’ll never clone a raptor ever again….

[Hot Tabasco]

This is the cat that killed the rat that ate the malt that lay in the house that Jack built.

[SunkenCiv]

(’Civ cues up the Aretha Franklin number...)