The First Apex Predators on Earth (that we know of)! 🦐 GEO GIRL

The first predator on Earth looked a lot different than predators on Earth today! These huge arthropods, called Anomalocarids, lived in Cambrian seas about 500 million years ago! They reached sizes much larger than other organisms at the time and acted as the apex predators in Earth's very first complex ecosystems. Before the Ediacaran period and Cambrian Explosion, animals did not exist yet. Sure, microbes ate other microbes on this early, 'pre-animal' Earth, but there was no real predation until animals came along. Animals evolved before the Cambrian, in the Ediacaran, but these first animals did not seem to have the complex hierarchy ecosystems that we see later during and after the Cambrian explosion. The Cambrian explosion marked not only a remarkable diversification of animal life, but also an increase in skeletons, shells, and other hard parts. This 'skeletonization' of life was likely in part allowed by changes in ocean chemistry, but the ultimate driver of this increase in organisms with hard parts was predation. Hard parts provide organisms with protection from predation which, until this time, had not been a threat. However, during the Cambrian explosion, Anomalocarids evolved, which changed everything! Hope you enjoy the video ;)

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0:00 Ediacaran Fauna & Cambrian Explosion
1:26 First Predators on Earth
2:14 Their Methods of Predation
4:20 Their Diversity
4:43 Their Surprisingly Short Time Range
5:23 Resulting Evolutionary Adaptations
8:33 Why Did They Go Extinct?
11:35 What Types of Predators Followed?
12:59 Lasting Impact of the First Predators

References:
Prothero, 2013 (Bringing Fossils to Life: An Introduction to Paleobiology), & references therein: https://amzn.to/3nU0ada
Earth System History: https://amzn.to/3v1Iy0G
Daley & Edgecombe, 2014 (Morphology of Anomalocaris canadensis from the Burgess Shale): https://doi.org/10.1666/13-067
Briggs & Fortey, 2005 (Wonderful strife: systematics, stem groups, and the phylogenetic signal of the Cambrian radiation): https://doi.org/10.1666/0094-8373(200...[0094:WSSSGA]2.0.CO;2
Gaines et al., 2008 (Cambrian Burgess Shale–type deposits share a common mode of fossilization): https://doi.org/10.1130/G24961A.1
Potin & Daley, 2023 (The significance of Anomalocaris and other Radiodonta for understanding paleoecology and evolution during the Cambrian explosion): https://doi.org/10.3389/feart.2023.11...
Vannier & Chen, 2000 (Early Cambrian food chain: new evidence from fossil aggregates in the Maotianshan Shale biota, SW China): https://doi.org/10.2110/palo.2003.p03-40
Vinther et al., 2014 (A suspension-feeding anomalocarid from the early Cambrian. Nature): https://doi.org/10.1038/nature13010
Yang et al., 2020 (Anomalocaridid trunk limb homology revealed by a giant filter-feeder with paired flaps. Nature): https://doi.org/10.1038/nature14256

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Oxygen by D. Canfield: https://amzn.to/3gffbCL
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