DinoFrontier
About Plesiochelys
Plesiochelys was a turtle that lived in the warm, shallow coastal seas and lagoons that covered much of Europe in the Late Jurassic. It belonged to the Thalassochelydia, one of the earliest groups of turtles to move into the sea.
Its shell was relatively flat and streamlined, and it probably stayed close to the coast rather than crossing open ocean like modern sea turtles do.
It was not the ancestor of today's sea turtles. Turtles took to the sea several times, and Plesiochelys belongs to an earlier, extinct branch.
Plesiochelys facts
- The Solothurn Turtle Limestone in Switzerland has produced hundreds of Late Jurassic turtle shells, many of them Plesiochelys.
- Its name means "near turtle", because early palaeontologists saw it as close to living turtles.
- It lived in the same seas as Ophthalmosaurus, Liopleurodon-like pliosaurs and marine crocodiles.
- Unlike modern sea turtles, it could still pull its head partly into its shell.
Discovery
Swiss palaeontologist Ludwig Rütimeyer named Plesiochelys in 1873 from the turtle limestones near Solothurn. Many more specimens have since been described from across western Europe.
