Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum. Here in nineteen ninety nine, researchers found what looked suspiciously like a meat cash. The Society for Vertebrate Paleontology had been given a report on a strange bone bed found near Douglas, Wyoming. Huddled together in a big pile were the fossilized skeletons of at least six different extinct North American camels. Compared to the humpbacked beasts of burden we know today, these were relatively small, about the size of domestic sheep. The skeletons at this particular site were deposited around thirty three point four million years ago. Many of the specimens had retained their heads, necks, ribcages, and front legs, but the back legs and hips. In other words, the camel's meaty hindquarters were missing. Oh what's more, distinctive, tooth marks riddled the bones. The evidence suggests that the pile of camel remains might have been a prehistoric meat locker, a cash where some predators had dragged and stored their prey. A look at the region's fossil record revealed that there was a killer beast alive back then whose teeth perfectly matched those gnarly bite marks. Its name is Archaetherium. Weighing an estimated six hundred pounds or about two hundred and seventy kilos, and measuring four and a half feet tall of the shoulder that's one and a half meters, this creature would have been a sight to see. It walked on cloven hoofs, Its legs were long and thin, There were bony knobs on its jawbones, and the animal's lengthy snout was full of crushing teeth. Archaeotherium belonged to a group of omnivores the patrolled Eurasia, North America, and Africa for millions of years. These were the terrifying inteledonts. Intelliedants have definitely won the awesome nickname sweepstakes. They're sometimes, if informally, called hell pigs or terminator pigs of porkine as these creatures might appear, though they're classified in a different taxonomical family than modern pigs. Opinions have varied over where they belong on the mammalian family tree. Everyone agrees that intellidants wore arteodactyls, the order that includes whales and all of the hooked mammals with an even number of toes, like camels, goats, and hippos. What's up for debate is their placement inside that group. Scientists used to think that pigs represent the intelliedant's closest living relatives, but that's no longer the consensus. A two thousand and nine paper concluded that these beasties were actually more akin to hippos and whales. A more than fifty intelligant species have come to light. The oldest that we're aware of rooted around China roughly thirty eight million years ago, shortly after the group made its way to North America. Early varieties tended to have short snouts, but within a few million years natural selection lengthened their upper and lower jaws. Though the intelligents started out small, huge ones quickly arrived on the scene. Archaethereum was one of the first truly large intellidonts, but by no means was it the biggest. As recently as eighteen million years ago, the Great Plains of North America were home to the towering Dayodon. At its shoulder this animal stood just under seven feet in height that's about two meters. Scientists think it could have tipped the scales at nine hundred and thirty pounds, or more so, over four hundred and thirty kilos. Daidon's head alone was three feet or a meter long. To support its weighty skull, the creature had powerful neck muscles connected to arches on the vertebra in its shoulder area, so like a bison or white rhino, it may have had a visible hump on its back. Your typical inteledont mouth had a combination of long canine tusks and blunt cheek teeth. A no living mammal has quite the same arrangement of pearly whites. A. Judging by the anatomy of these snout and the bony surfaces where the jaw muscles would have been anchored, it's clear that inteloedants could open their mouths quite widely, and if the size of those muscle attachment points are any indication, the larger, long snouted hell pigs delivered powerful bites alike today's pigs and teleedants were almost certainly omnivores, aware marks on their teeth suggest the animals spent a lot of time gnawing on bones. Paleontologists speculate that inteloedants were efficient scavengers that probably took down live prey as well. Hard roots, eggs, fruits, and vegetation may have also played an importan role in their diets. But inteledant teeth weren't just reserved for meal time. Gouge like tooth marks have been found on some intelligant skulls. A puncture wounds and healed over scratches, sometimes measuring almost an inch or two centimeters deep, tell us that the animals occasionally fought by biting each other's faces. A few animals bear tusque injuries around their eyes. However, being able to intimidate your rivals is also an important skill for many territorial mammals. That might explain why so many intelligants had long, flaring cheek bones projecting from the sides of their heads. Another hypothesis is that these two were muscle anchoring points. In addition, numerous species possessed bony knobs on the undersides of their jaws that could have played roles in intimidation or one on one combat. The last intelligants died out about sixteen million years ago. No one knows why they when extinct, but the spread of new equally massive mam million predators could have had something to do with it, like the also now extinct bear dogs, but they're a different episode. Today's episode is based on the article scary prehistoric hell pigs once roam to the Earth on how stuffworks dot Com, written by Mark Mancini. Green Stuff is production of iHeartRadio in partnership with how stuffworks dot Com, and it's produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum. Here in nineteen ninety nine, researchers found what looked suspiciously like a meat cash. The Society for Vertebrate Paleontology had been given a report on a strange bone bed found near Douglas, Wyoming. Huddled together in a big pile were the fossilized skeletons of at least six different extinct North American camels. Compared to the humpbacked beasts of burden we know today, these were relatively small, about the size of domestic sheep. The skeletons at this particular site were deposited around thirty three point four million years ago. Many of the specimens had retained their heads, necks, ribcages, and front legs, but the back legs and hips. In other words, the camel's meaty hindquarters were missing. Oh what's more, distinctive, tooth marks riddled the bones. The evidence suggests that the pile of camel remains might have been a prehistoric meat locker, a cash where some predators had dragged and stored their prey. A look at the region's fossil record revealed that there was a killer beast alive back then whose teeth perfectly matched those gnarly bite marks. Its name is Archaetherium. Weighing an estimated six hundred pounds or about two hundred and seventy kilos, and measuring four and a half feet tall of the shoulder that's one and a half meters, this creature would have been a sight to see. It walked on cloven hoofs, Its legs were long and thin, There were bony knobs on its jawbones, and the animal's lengthy snout was full of crushing teeth. Archaeotherium belonged to a group of omnivores the patrolled Eurasia, North America, and Africa for millions of years. These were the terrifying inteledonts. Intelliedants have definitely won the awesome nickname sweepstakes. They're sometimes, if informally, called hell pigs or terminator pigs of porkine as these creatures might appear, though they're classified in a different taxonomical family than modern pigs. Opinions have varied over where they belong on the mammalian family tree. Everyone agrees that intellidants wore arteodactyls, the order that includes whales and all of the hooked mammals with an even number of toes, like camels, goats, and hippos. What's up for debate is their placement inside that group. Scientists used to think that pigs represent the intelliedant's closest living relatives, but that's no longer the consensus. A two thousand and nine paper concluded that these beasties were actually more akin to hippos and whales. A more than fifty intelligant species have come to light. The oldest that we're aware of rooted around China roughly thirty eight million years ago, shortly after the group made its way to North America. Early varieties tended to have short snouts, but within a few million years natural selection lengthened their upper and lower jaws. Though the intelligents started out small, huge ones quickly arrived on the scene. Archaethereum was one of the first truly large intellidonts, but by no means was it the biggest. As recently as eighteen million years ago, the Great Plains of North America were home to the towering Dayodon. At its shoulder this animal stood just under seven feet in height that's about two meters. Scientists think it could have tipped the scales at nine hundred and thirty pounds, or more so, over four hundred and thirty kilos. Daidon's head alone was three feet or a meter long. To support its weighty skull, the creature had powerful neck muscles connected to arches on the vertebra in its shoulder area, so like a bison or white rhino, it may have had a visible hump on its back. Your typical inteledont mouth had a combination of long canine tusks and blunt cheek teeth. A no living mammal has quite the same arrangement of pearly whites. A. Judging by the anatomy of these snout and the bony surfaces where the jaw muscles would have been anchored, it's clear that inteloedants could open their mouths quite widely, and if the size of those muscle attachment points are any indication, the larger, long snouted hell pigs delivered powerful bites alike today's pigs and teleedants were almost certainly omnivores, aware marks on their teeth suggest the animals spent a lot of time gnawing on bones. Paleontologists speculate that inteloedants were efficient scavengers that probably took down live prey as well. Hard roots, eggs, fruits, and vegetation may have also played an importan role in their diets. But inteledant teeth weren't just reserved for meal time. Gouge like tooth marks have been found on some intelligant skulls. A puncture wounds and healed over scratches, sometimes measuring almost an inch or two centimeters deep, tell us that the animals occasionally fought by biting each other's faces. A few animals bear tusque injuries around their eyes. However, being able to intimidate your rivals is also an important skill for many territorial mammals. That might explain why so many intelligants had long, flaring cheek bones projecting from the sides of their heads. Another hypothesis is that these two were muscle anchoring points. In addition, numerous species possessed bony knobs on the undersides of their jaws that could have played roles in intimidation or one on one combat. The last intelligants died out about sixteen million years ago. No one knows why they when extinct, but the spread of new equally massive mam million predators could have had something to do with it, like the also now extinct bear dogs, but they're a different episode. Today's episode is based on the article scary prehistoric hell pigs once roam to the Earth on how stuffworks dot Com, written by Mark Mancini. Green Stuff is production of iHeartRadio in partnership with how stuffworks dot Com, and it's produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.