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↑ 'Smallest reptile on earth' discovered in Madagascar.

Amniota, Mammals, reptiles (turtles, lizards, Sphenodon, crocodiles, birds) and their extinct relatives. Knoxville, Tennessee: The Paleontological Society. Schoch (eds) Major features of vertebrate evolution. 'Observations of the structure of the Early Permian reptile Stereosternum tumidum Cope'. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. 'A reevaluation of early amniote phylogeny' (PDF). Systematics Association, Special vol 35A. Benton (ed) The phylogeny and classification of the tetrapods, Volume 1: Amphibians, Reptiles, Birds.

↑ 4.0 4.1 Gauthier J.A., Kluge A.G & Rowe T.

Studies on the structure and development of vertebrates. The University of Georgia Museum of Natural History.

↑ Some give birth to live young, with the cleidoic eggs developing internally.

Order Testudines ( turtles, tortoises, and terrapins): approximately 300 species.

Order Squamata ( lizards, snakes, and amphisbaenids ('worm-lizards'): about 7,000 species.

Order Sphenodontia ( Tuatara from New Zealand): 2 species.

Order Crocodilia ( crocodiles, gavials, caimans, and alligators): 23 species.

Titanosaurs were the largest land reptiles, and the smallest land reptile is a chameleon 13.5mm long. Their land sizes can be both bigger and smaller than mammals. Reptiles can live in large and small sizes. Whitish or translucent, it can be drawn across the eye to protect it from dust and keep it moist. The two groups split in the Carboniferous, from stem-group Amniotes (the early tetrapods, which laid cleidoic eggs).Ī membrane forms an inner eyelid in reptiles and birds. Some taxonomists, such as Benton, make Sauropsida and Synapsida class-level taxa. Since reptiles are not monophyletic, reclassifying them is one of the key aims of researchers. Mammals are a genuine clade, and so Mammalia is still the taxonomic term. Reptile is still the usual informal term to describe living snakes and lizards.

Class Synapsida includes mammals and all their forebears. So instead of Reptilia as a taxonomic class, today many experts use Class Sauropsida (which includes all reptiles and birds, living and extinct). Another reason is that the word 'reptile' is misleading because many extinct types were very different from living reptiles. The main reason is that the term 'reptile' does not include birds, the descendents of theropod dinosaurs. Reptilia is an evolutionary grade rather than a clade. Theropod dinosaurs are even more closely related, because birds evolved from them.Ĭladistic writers prefer to put the birds (over 10,000 species) with what people usually call reptiles. Crocodiles are more closely related to birds than they are to lizards. Some reptiles are more closely related to birds than they are to other reptiles. The study of living reptiles is called herpetology.īirds in relation to reptiles The great majority of present-day reptiles are snakes and lizards. Ancient reptiles that do survive include the turtles, the crocodiles and the Tuatara, the lone survivor of its group. We used to say the dinosaurs were extinct, but they survive in the form of their feathered descendants ( birds).

Many important groups of reptiles are now extinct, for example the mosasaurs. Reptiles also share an arrangement of the heart and major blood vessels which is different from that of mammals. A cloaca is a shared opening for the anus, urinary tract and reproductive ducts. They excrete uric acid (instead of urea), and have a cloaca. All living reptile species are cold blooded, have scaly skin, and lay cleidoic eggs. The name 'reptile' comes from Latin and means 'one who creeps'. It is not used so much by biologists, who use more accurate terms. Reptile is the common name for one of the main groups of land vertebrates. Global reptile distribution (excluding birds) Aves (birds) (included in cladistic analyses, but excluded in traditional taxonomy).Rhynchocephalia ( tuatara and relatives).Temporal range: Pennsylvanian– present, 312–0 myaĬlockwise from above left: Green sea turtle ( Chelonia mydas), Tuatara ( Sphenodon punctatus), Nile crocodile ( Crocodylus niloticus), and Sinai agama ( Pseudotrapelus sinaitus)

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