Didelphodon, known largely from its appearance as a background character in the final episode of the 1999 BBC series Walking with Dinosaurs, was a large prehistoric mammal which lived in North America during the late Cretaceous Period 73-66 million years ago.
Most prehistoric mammals which lived during the age of dinosaurs were small mouse-sized or rat-sized critters who scurried through the undergrowth. Didelphodon was definitely not one of these. In fact, it is the largest Mesozoic mammal from North America. Its skull alone measured 5 inches long – that’s about the same size as most Mesozoic mammals’ entire body – and its total length was about 3.5 feet long. Despite a superficial resemblance to a giant weasel or mongoose, Didelphodon was actually a marsupial, making it more closely related to kangaroos, possums, and wombats. Specifically, Didelphodon belonged to a group of marsupials called the stagodontids, which all went extinct at the end of the Mesozoic Era.
There are currently three species of Didelphodon: D. coyi, D. padanicus, and D. vorax. Of these, D. coyi is the oldest, known from early Maastrichtian deposits within the Horseshoe Canyon Formation of Canada. Didelphodon padanicus is known from South Dakota from the rocks of the Lance Formation, which dates to the late Maastrichtian. Didelphodon vorax seems to have been the most widespread. Specimens of this species have been found in upper Maastrichtian strata within the Lance Formation in Wyoming, the Hell Creek Formation in Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota, the Frenchman Formation of Saskatchewan, and the Scollard Formation of Alberta.
Didelphodon had a bulky massive skull with a square Rottweiler or pit bull-like face with large jaw muscles and thick robustly-built teeth that seemed perfect for cracking through hard objects like bones. Forward-angled eyes show that it had stereoscopic vision, but the eyes sockets themselves were small, suggesting that it was a day-active animal. It’s been proposed that this animal might have been semi-aquatic like an otter and fed on hard-shelled animals like clams and crustaceans.
Didelphodon vorax. © Jason R. Abdale (November 28, 2024).
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Categories: Paleontology, Uncategorized
DINOSAURS AND BARBARIANS 
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