Gorgonopsid was a huge mammal-like reptile from the Permian Period. The Permian Period was the last period before the dinosaurs. So Gorganopsid was NOT a dinosaur. . . but it was as scary as one!
There were a few species. But they all were big. They were around 10 feet or 9 meters long. They had 4-5 inch long saber fangs. Their head was like the head of a giant dog.
They preyed on herbivores like Scutosaurus. This type of animal apparently left no descendants. It went extinct with the superheated Earth incident at the end of the Permian Period. The next period was the Triassic Period... when dinosaurs appeared.
So, at the end of the Permian there were massive volcanic eruptions in what is now Siberia. This seems to have overheated the Earth. This "great dying" killed off something like 95% of plant and animal species. Gorgonopsid was too big to dig a burrow to hide in so that species was forced into extinction by the heat.
Some other mammal-like reptiles survived BECAUSE they dug burrows and could stay cool in the superheated conditions. A few feet underground it was still cool.
To be clear, there were several periods in the Paleozoic Era. The Permian was the last period of the Paleozoic Era. There were 3 periods in the Mesozoic Era. They are: Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous Periods. The name "Jurassic" is most well known, because of the awesome Jurassic Park/World movies. But most of the dinosaurs in the first Jurassic Park movie were actually from the Cretaceous Period. The Cretaceous Period was the last period of the Mesozoic Era.
The Cretaceous Period also had an upsurge of volcanic activity near the end of the period. That is similar to the end of the Permian. Some fossil evidence shows that some dinos were already dying out before the meteorite hit and finished them off. So both the Permian Period and the Cretaceous Period ended with heat.
During the Permian Period the continents were all together to form the supercontinent of Pangea. Much of Pangea was desert and that seems to be where Gorganopsid lived and hunted.
Below is a Gorganopsid that is drawn with hair. It WAS a mammal-like reptile so it may have had some hair or fur. Perhaps it did not. Paleontologist HAVE found coprolite (fossilized feces) from the Permian Period... and that coprolite had fur or hair in it. So at least SOME of the mammal-like reptiles of the Permian must have had hair or fur.
Perhaps they only had a little hair... like an elephant. I drew this first Gorganopsid with only a little hair. It is over most parts of the body, but it is not thick and bushy.
I am including a drawing that I did several years ago of Gorganopsid with no fur or hair. It is an older drawing. The styles are different but both could be accurate.
The Scutosaurus drawings are here to show you what was probably the biggest prey species available for Gorgonopsid to hunt. Scutosuars was also around 10 feet or 3 meters long. But Scutosaurus was had a much smaller head and teeth designed for eating desert plants, not meat. Scutosaurus looks a lot like a modern horned lizard. We call horned lizards Horny Toads. But they are reptiles, not amphibians.
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Gorgonopsid with Fur or Hair
Gorganopsid in the Desert
Scutosaurus in Permian Desert
(I recently added to this picture and the enhanced drawing follows...)
Scutosaurus and Gorgonopsid
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