Scientific Illustration

paleoillustration:

“Bad day at the tar pits, as a sabre-toothed cat (Smilodon) attacks an already entrapped giant ground sloth, Paramylodon”. By Mauricio Antón.

thagomizers:

Glyptodon reticulatus (“grooved tooth”)
Chordata/Mammalia/Xenartha/Cingulata/Glyptodontidae

• Pleistocene (2 Ma - 10,000 years)
• 10.8 ft in length and 2 tons

Described in 1839
Location : South America
Diet : Herbivore

paleoillustration:

“The First Snow”, Smilodon populator by Víctor Zubeldía.

paleoillustration:

Smilodon reconstruction by Mauricio Antón

lostbeasts:

by Zdenek Burian

inhumanoid:

Reconstructed Face of Extinct “Hobbit” Species Is Startlingly Humanlike

paleoillustration:

Diprotodon, meaning “two forward teeth”, sometimes known as the giant wombat or the rhinoceros wombat, is the largest known marsupial ever to have lived. (Wikipedia). Picture by Peter Trusler

ancientbeasts:

Gigantopithecus:

Epoch: Pleistocene

Size: 3m tall standing upright

Gigantopithecus is the animal which some believe sparked the big foot myth. Standing at 3m tall, this giant ape called the bamboo forests of Asia home 100,000 years ago. At the same time as some of our ancestors (homo erectus). It is unclear whether the two met often but it is thought that our ancestors would generally avoid the far larger gigantopithecus. Because although it was a herbivore feeding on bamboo for the majority of its time, it was still a very dangerous animal should it be disturbed at a bad time. There has been some debate among the scientific community as to whether it stood upright, or whether it walked with its arms like a modern gorilla or chimpanzee. The only fossil finds of this huge ape are teeth and jaw bones so it is extremely difficult to deduce whether or not it was bipedal. One theory is that it was bipedal because of the shape and thickness of the jaw which appears to have allowed the windpipe to fit within the jaw. This allowed the skull to sit more or less on top of the spine rather than in front of it. Another opinion is that the immense size of the animal would put far too much stress on the lower portion of its body for it to be bipedal. Personally, I like to think it was bipedal, simply because of how impressive that would have been; but I also believe it far more likely that it was quadrupedal. 

(via lostbeasts)

lostbeasts:

Zaglossus hacketti.
It was the size of a sheep, making it the largest monotreme known to have ever lived. Z. hacketti lived during the Pleistocene epoch in Australia.

plio-cavedeposits:

The skull of a Procoptodon, a genus of the Pleistocene giant kangaroo. It was so called short-faced kangaroo with a flat blunt face. 

Wikipedia  About.com

The largest of them was  Procoptodon goliah with height up to 2m and а weight more than 200kg

P. goliah on a stamp