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“Missing link” found on Ellesmere

Researchers find remains of land-crawling fish with neck, wrists

JOHN THOMPSON

CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE
The Tiktaaluk roseae, found on Ellesmere Island, could have been the first creature to crawl from the ocean on to land. The model to the left shows how researchers imagine the creature looked, based on several fossils discovered, such as the one seen on the right. (PHOTO COURTESY OF UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO HOSPITALS)

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The strange creature, which lived about 375 million years ago, has a head like an alligator, the scales of a fish, and front fins that have wrists and bones similar to fingers, allowing it to flop over logs and make brief excursions on to land.

Researchers have named the creature Tiktaaluk roseae, after consulting with Inuit elders.

Its first name means large freshwater fish. It apparently grew between four and nine feet long, living in the shallow waters. It had sharp fangs and ate meat, which could include millipedes and centipedes that squirmed along the land.

Theories of evolution hold that all life began in the oceans, but until the discovery of Tiktaaluk, no evidence existed of what the leap from water to land looked like. Because of this, scientists have called Tiktaaluk a “missing link” in the evolution of life on earth.

Tiktaaluk has other unusual traits. It has both gills and nostrils. Unlike other fish, it has a neck. And it has two sets of ribs: tiny ones like a fish, and then larger ones that would help support its weight while crawling on land.

Ellesmere Island was a far different place 375 million years ago than it is now. Tiktaaluk lived in shallow, slow-moving rivers that resembled the Mississippi River. And at that time, the island was part of a large continent that straddled the equator, with a subtropical climate.

Three nearly-complete specimens of the creature were found in 2004 by researchers on the southwestern corner of Ellesmere. Their discovery was reported in the April 6 issue of the journal Nature.

National Geographic created this illustration of the creature.

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Tiktaaluk isn’t the first strange creature to be unearthed on Ellesmere. In 2002, researchers discovered the fossils of an ancient beaver pond on the island, estimated to be five million years old — far, far younger than Tiktaaluk.

The pond also contained the remains of other species – including a wolverine, an Asian badger, a three-toed horse and an ancestor of the Siberian musk deer. Trees found at the site included many living species, such as alder and birch, but also extinct kinds of larch, spruce and a pine closely related to the living Japanese stone pine.

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