Laganosuchus is an extinct genus

Genus

In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...

 of stomatosuchid

Stomatosuchidae

Stomatosuchidae is an extinct family of neosuchian crocodylomorphs. It is currently defined as the most inclusive clade containing Stomatosuchus inermis but not Notosuchus terrestris, Simosuchus clarki, Araripesuchus gomesii, Baurusuchus pachecoi, Peirosaurus torminni, or Crocodylus niloticus...

 crocodyliform. Fossils have been found from Niger

Niger

Niger , officially named the Republic of Niger, is a landlocked country in Western Africa, named after the Niger River. It borders Nigeria and Benin to the south, Burkina Faso and Mali to the west, Algeria and Libya to the north and Chad to the east...

 and Morocco

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

 and date back to the Upper Cretaceous. The name means "pancake crocodile" from the Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...

 laganon ("pancake") and souchos ("crocodile") in reference to the shallow depth of the skull, which is characteristic of all stomatosuchids. It has been nicknamed "PancakeCroc" by Paul Sereno

Paul Sereno

Paul Callistus Sereno is an American paleontologist from the University of Chicago who discovered several new dinosaur species on several continents. He has conducted excavations at sites as varied as Inner Mongolia, Argentina, Morocco, and Niger...

 and Hans Larsson

Hans Larsson

Hans Larsson was a Swedish Professor of Philosophy at Lund University, Sweden and a Member of the Swedish Academy , chair no. 15. He was known in Sweden as Kloke-Hans .Prof. Larsson was a humanist and an author...

, who first described the genus in a monograph published in ZooKeys

ZooKeys

ZooKeys is a peer-reviewed open access academic journal for the field of zoology. It was established in 2008, and the editor-in-chief is Terry Erwin from the Smithsonian Institution...

in 2009 along with other Saharan crocodyliformes such as Anatosuchus

Anatosuchus

Anatosuchus is an extinct genus of notosuchian crocodylomorph discovered in Gadoufaoua, Niger, and described by a team of palaeontologists led by the American Paul Sereno in 2003, in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology...

and Kaprosuchus

Kaprosuchus

Kaprosuchus is an extinct genus of mahajangasuchid crocodyliform. It is known from a single nearly complete skull collected from the Upper Cretaceous Echkar Formation of Niger. The name means "boar crocodile" from the Greek kapros and souchos in reference to its unusually large caniniform teeth...

.

The type species

Type species

In biological nomenclature, a type species is both a concept and a practical system which is used in the classification and nomenclature of animals and plants. The value of a "type species" lies in the fact that it makes clear what is meant by a particular genus name. A type species is the species...

 is L. thaumastos from the Cenomanian

Cenomanian

The Cenomanian is, in the ICS' geological timescale the oldest or earliest age of the Late Cretaceous epoch or the lowest stage of the Upper Cretaceous series. An age is a unit of geochronology: it is a unit of time; the stage is a unit in the stratigraphic column deposited during the corresponding...

-age Echkar Formation in Niger. A second species, L. maghrebensis, is known from the Kem Kem Beds

Kem Kem Beds

The Kem Kem Beds is a geological formation in Morocco and Algeria whose strata date back to the Late Cretaceous...

 in Morocco, which are also Cenomanian in age.

Paleobiology

According to Sereno, L. thaumastos was an approximately 20 foot (6 m) long, squat fish-eater with a 3 foot (1 m) flat head. It would have stayed motionless for hours, waiting for prey to swim into its open jaws with spike-shaped teeth.

External links

• ZooBank
• Laganosuchus in the Paleobiology Database
  Paleobiology Database
  ' is an online resource for information on the distribution and classification of fossil animals, plants, and microorganisms.-History:The Paleobiology Database was founded in 2000. It has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the Australian Research Council...