Explore this animal in Size of Extinct Animals ↗
313 / Mesozoic
Baculites
Baculites compressus
Its adult shell stretched into a near-straight rod while retaining ammonite sutures.
View original image · 1536 × 1024- Time range
- About 81–66 million years ago
- Final stage
- End of the Cretaceous
- Geographic range
- Western Interior Seaway · North America
01 / DEFINITION & ECOLOGY
What was Baculites?
Baculites (Baculites compressus) was an extinct organism known from About 81–66 million years ago, with a range in Western Interior Seaway · North America.
Life and ecology
The animal occupied the final chamber and regulated buoyancy through internal chambers.
02 / DISAPPEARANCE
Why did Baculites disappear?
Ammonites as a group disappeared in the food-web collapse that followed the end-Cretaceous impact; the latest records of Baculites fall near that event.
03 / EVIDENCE
How do scientists know about Baculites?
Abundant shells, septa, sutures and jaws document growth and affinity.
04 / SOURCES & FURTHER READING
Check the source record
Use the scientific name to compare taxonomy, occurrence records and the fossil record. Database coverage and classifications may differ.
05 / REVISION HISTORY
How has this record changed?
- Rewrote an extinction cause that presented environmental or faunal turnover as established; it is now given as context the record does not prove.
- Verified authoritative entity sources and added three responsive reconstruction sizes.
- Initial bilingual species record published.
06 / CORRECTIONS & ADDITIONS