Scientists have described the largest and oldest freshwater dolphin: details

Scientists have described the largest and oldest freshwater dolphin

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Archaeologists in Peru have found the skull of a 16-million-year-old river dolphin. He swam in the waters of the current Amazon.

About this it is said in a report by scientists published in the journal Science Advances, informs Reuters.

Paleontologist Rodolfo Salas noted that the skull belonged to the largest dolphin that lived in the waters of South America. It was 3 to 3.5 meters long.

Scientists discovered a combination of morphological features in the dolphin, which indicated that the animals changed their environment from marine to freshwater.

Migrations of freshwater cetaceans took place in several areas – this is how modern “river dolphins” arose. There were four types of them, but only two have survived to this day.

The fossil of this dolphin was found in 2018. It was named Pebanista yacuruna after a Peruvian mythological creature that lived in deep water.

According to the scientist, this mammal is the ancestor of the dolphins of the Ganges River in India, although the ancestors of both animals previously lived exclusively in the ocean.

“This allowed them to occupy large ocean spaces off the coast of India and South America.

These animals lived in freshwater environments both in the Amazon and in India. Unfortunately, they are extinct in the Amazon”– added paleontologist Salas.

A species known as the Amazon river dolphin, also known as the pink river dolphin or boto, still lives in the Amazon and Orinoco river basins.