Overview

• The peer-reviewed description appears in Papers in Palaeontology, led by ichthyosaur specialist Dean Lomax with co-author Judy Massare.
• The single known specimen was discovered in 2001 near Golden Cap on England’s Jurassic Coast by fossil hunter Chris Moore and is curated at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.
• The animal is dated to the Pliensbachian about 185 million years ago and is estimated to have been roughly three metres long.
• Distinctive anatomy includes a large eye orbit, a long sword-shaped snout, and an unusual spike-like bone near the nostril.
• The team infers a diet of fish and squid and notes possible bite marks on the skull that could indicate a larger ichthyosaur as the predator.