Animals That Were SCARIER Than Dinosaurs

Our planet has been around for a lot longer than the dinosaurs’ reign and, as it turns out, nature has been quite adept at producing nightmare-inducing monsters other than dinosaurs. To think that dinosaurs are the only scary inhabitants of our prehistoric past would be a big, big mistake. Today we will tell you about animals that were scarier than dinosaurs.
10. Titanoboa
A life-size model of the Titanoboa. If the movie Anaconda terrified you (and not because of J-Lo’s acting), you might want to skip this one. Simply put, Titanoboa is the largest snake that ever existed. It grew to more than 40 feet long and could weigh up to 2,500 pounds. To put things in perspective, that’s almost as much as a grown giraffe weighs. Titanoboa appeared not long after the dinosaurs went extinct, perhaps filling a niche left open by the disappearance of the world’s former top predators. For those of you with ophidiophobia, this one’s for you. It likely hunted much like crocodiles do, lurking, partially submerged at the water’s edge so that it could ambush thirsty, unsuspecting animals. It would strike from the water and wrap itself around its prey, delivering a crushing death. It lived in the rain forests of South America where temperatures were warmer than the tropics of today. This allowed the cold-blooded reptiles to grow larger that modern reptiles can. This snake would have Indiana Jones trembling in his fedora.
9. Mosasaurus
A mosasaurus as depicted in Jurassic World. Like plesiosaurs, mosasaurs were marine reptiles, and not technically dinosaurs. At almost 60 feet in length, mosasaurus was the biggest of the bunch. In fact, it was one of the most dangerous creatures prowling the waters throughout the entire Cretaceous period. It looked like a massive crocodile (particularly the head), only equipped with fins, which — terrifyingly — allowed it better mobility in the water.
8. Arthropleura
This in not something you want to see crawling around the woods when you’re out for a hike. Arthropleura was an 8.5 foot long millipede from the Carboniferous era and through it was herbivorous, likely feeding on dead plant matter like modern millipedes, it still has scare factor. Just because it won’t try to eat you doesn’t prevent it from being creepy while it scuttles about. Fossil trackways have been discovered showing that Arthropleura could move and maneuver quickly, undulating hundreds of legs in rhythm to nauseate and disturb anyone watching. These are the largest know land invertebrates of all time and it is unlikely the they had any predators, but it could probably rear up into a defensive posture and look you straight in the eyes.
7. Helicoprion
The mystery of this bizarre fish starts with a weird fossil and numerous attempts to figure out what it was and how to classify it. Helicoprion puzzled palaeontologists and ichthyologists for over a century. The only remains of this creature, up until 2013, were from a fossilized whorl of teeth. While most scientists agreed that the teeth belonged to the lower jaw, that didn’t prevent the presumed location of the teeth from migrating around the body in sometimes fanciful arrangements that can be seen in numerous illustrations and reconstructions. With the later discovery of some portions of a jaw, the location of its buzzsaw-like teeth were finally determined to fill the lower jaw. Strangely, there were no upper teeth; so this creature could disgustingly gum and bite you at the same time. The jaw would close, rotating the teeth backwards, much like a circular saw blade. It probably fed on the soft bodies of squid and other cephalopods. The whorl of teeth was formed as they continuously grew outwards, creating a spiral as it aged; the teeth at the beginning of the whorl being small and gradually increasing in size toward the end. Another fish with an equally odd and terrifying face, Edestus, had offset scissor like jaws that protrude out of its face.