Pliosaurus is a 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 extinct marine reptile. It is included in the family Pliosauridae

Pliosauridae

Pliosauridae is a family of pliosauroid plesiosaurs from the Earliest Jurassic to the early Late Cretaceous of Australia, Europe, North America and South America. It was formally named by Harry G...

. Its diet would have included fish

Fish

Fish are a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic vertebrate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups...

, squid

Squid

Squid are cephalopods of the order Teuthida, which comprises around 300 species. Like all other cephalopods, squid have a distinct head, bilateral symmetry, a mantle, and arms. Squid, like cuttlefish, have eight arms arranged in pairs and two, usually longer, tentacles...

 and other marine reptile

Marine reptile

Marine reptiles are reptiles which have become secondarily adapted for an aquatic or semi-aquatic life in a marine environment.The earliest marine reptiles arose in the Permian period during the Paleozoic era...

s. This genus has contained several species in the past but it currently consists of the type species P. brachydeirus, P. macromerus and P. portentificus.

Discovery and Species

Currently there are three recognized species of Pliosaurus, all known from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation of England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.

Pliosaurus brachydeirus and Pliosaurus macromerus are both known from the Kimmeridgian

Kimmeridgian

In the geologic timescale, the Kimmeridgian is an age or stage in the Late or Upper Jurassic epoch or series. It spans the time between 155.7 ± 4 Ma and 150.8 ± 4 Ma . The Kimmeridgian follows the Oxfordian and precedes the Tithonian....

of England.

Pliosaurus portentificus is known from the late Kimmeridgian of England.

Websites

• http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSL2771508220080227?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=0
• http://www.norway.org/restech/researchnews/pliosaurus.htm
• http://www.nhm.uio.no/pliosaurus/index.html
• http://www.nationalgeographic.com/seamonsters/timeline/#pliosaurus
• http://www.britannica.com/facts/5/252688/pliosaur-as-discussed-in-plesiosaur-fossil-marine-reptile