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Acknowledgements: Silke Baron, C.C. Licence 2.0, pp. 4 and 20b

Jonathan Zander, C.C. Licence 3.0, pp. 5 and 32b Linda, C.C. Licence 2.0, p. 11a Jean, C.C. Licence 2.0, p. 11b

Albert Kok, C.C. Licence 3.0, p. 12a and f Joe Lencioni, C.C. Licence 2.5, p. 12b

Patrick Quinn-Graham, C.C. Licence 2.0, p. 12c Valerie Everett, C.C. Licence 2.0, p. 12d

Brian Gratwicke, C.C. Licence 2.0, pp. 12e and 14g Brocken Inaglory, C.C. Licence 2.5, p. 15a

Vinayaraj, C.C. Licence 3.0, p. 15c Uploaded977, C.C. Licence 3.0, p. 19a

Neutrality, C.C. Licence 3.0, p. 22a Shyamal, C.C. Licence 3.0, p. 22b

Orin Zebest, C.C. Licence 2.0, p. 27 Norman.benton, C.C. Licence 3.0, p. 29b

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Biology - 3

Fish, Amphibians and Reptiles

CONTENTS

Objectives Words to Know

5 6,13,26

I. Fish 7 Lampreys and Hagfish 7 Sharks, Rays, and Skates 9 Bony Fish 14

II. Amphibians 21 Caecilians 22 Salamanders 22 Toads and Frogs 23

III. Reptiles 27 Snakes and Lizards 27 Tortoises and Turtles 31 Crocodiles and Alligators 32 Tuatara 33 Dinosaurs 33

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while most of its head stays just below the water surface as it searches for food.

A crocodilian's diet varies, depending upon the type and age of the reptile. The young eat insects and small crayfish. As a crocodilian grows older, it begins eating fish, snakes, and frogs. Adults usually feed on rats and large animals. Some adults have been seen eating cows and deer. A few of the larger crocodilians have been known to attack and eat humans. The best-known maneaters - the African, or Nile, crocodile and the saltwater crocodile - inhabit Africa, Asia, the Philippines, and many other islands.

Crocodiles and alligators are oviparous. Usually, the female digs a hole in the sand in which to lay her eggs. The American alligator places its eggs in a small hill of decaying vegetation. Warmth given off by the rotting matter incubates the eggs. When the young are ready to hatch, they make a peeping noise. The female hears the peeping and tears the nest apart. She then gently carries her young in her mouth to the safety of the water.

Crocodilians are covered with a thick, tough skin and have tough plates over some parts of their bodies. The alligator's skin has been used to make shoes, handbags, suitcases, and belts. Laws now protect alligators in the United States, and they are killed only to control their population.

Tuatara Order Rhynchocephalia, which means "snout-head," has only one living species, the tuatara, or "spine bearer." It is a lizardlike animal 20 to 30 inches (50 to 80 cm) long that may live more than seventy years. The tuatara's most distinctive features are teeth that are not set in sockets and a third eye on the top of its head. The third eye, called a parietal (ps-rT'a*tal) eye, has a structure like that of a retina, but the eye is nonfunctional and covered with scales. New Zealand now protects these reptiles since they have vanished from all but one or two tiny islands in Cook Strait between North Island and South Island.

Dinosaurs Alligators and crocodiles are very large reptiles, but some dinosaurs grew to be the world's largest reptiles and land animals. After the first finds of some large reptile fossils, the term "dinosaur" was coined from two Greek words meaning "terrible" and "lizard." Although we usually think of the larger dinosaurs, most were probably about the size of a horse or smaller.

Biblical evidence seems to indicate that men and dinosaurs lived at the same time. Some biblical scholars believe that two references in the book of Job refer to dinosaurs. One reference mentions

Saltwater Crocodile Tuatara

the "behemoth," whose description could fit the brachiosaur, and the other refers to "leviathan," whose description could fit the plesiosaur. Job's description suggests that perhaps he personally saw these creatures or he was familiar with someone else who did see them.

Pictures of dinosaurs have been discovered in ancient rock carvings and paintings. A reptile that could be an allosaur or a tyrannosaur is etched on the walls of Rattlesnake Canyon in Colorado. African bushmen painted pictures of other dinosaur­like creatures with pictures of a hippopotamus, giraffe, and elephant on the walls of a cave near Harare (ha>ra'ra ), Zimbabwe (zTnvba'bwa). These drawings made by man are an indication of the possibility that dinosaurs coexisted with man.

Chinese, Egyptian, and Irish stories of dragons may also have arisen from the stories of men who saw dinosaurs and passed on their descriptions to later generations.

The existence of evidence that could suggest that dinosaurs existed with humans would be an important discovery. Evidence that humans existed at the time of the dinosaurs would challenge the evolutionists' theory that dinosaurs lived 70 million years before man. From a Biblical perspective, God must have created dinosaurs on the sixth day. He created man later the same day.

Fossils of dinosaurs resulted from those that died in Noah's Flood. As the Floodwaters subsided, their bodies were covered with silt, fossilized, and preserved until their recent discovery.

The Flood caused drastic changes on the Earth and to its climate. If Noah took small or young dinosaurs on the Ark, it is likely that they would not have survived in the changed climate of the Earth after the Flood. Hence most dinosaur species became extinct.

As astonishing as it may seem, many evolutionists theorize that fish evolved into amphibians and amphibians into reptiles. Evolutionists further theorize that all this change took place gradually over millions of years.

For the change to have taken place many transitional forms would have developed. However, the fossil record does not have the evidence of transitional forms required to support an evolutionary model. From a Biblical perspective this is no surprise. The Bible declares that God created each type offish, amphibian, and reptile as separate, unique animals. Any similarities that exist among them are due to the fact that one Master Craftsman fashioned them all.

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