Razanandrongobe: Giant Jurassic Malagasy Croc

[ZoPteryx]

Giant teeth from the Middle Jurassic of Madagascar, originally suggested to be either a theropod or a crocodylomorph, are confirmed to belong to one of the first and largest notosuchians of all time!  The revelation was the result of the discovery of new skull bones found along with the very distinctive bulbous teeth.  Wear patterns suggest this beast preferred rather hard food items, perhaps bone; but seeing as this is a notosuchian we're talking about, plant matter may have very well been on the menu too.

The open access paper:
https://peerj.com/articles/3481/

Andrea Cau's take:
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A//theropoda.blogspot.com/2017/07/il-ritorno-di-razanandrongobe.html&hl=en&langpair=it|en&tbb=1&ie=UTF-8

[Halichoeres]

Always nice to see an enigmatic taxon to find a new provisional home.

[ZoPteryx]

Always nice to see an enigmatic taxon to find a new provisional home.

It is indeed!

I wonder what this means as goes the biogeography of Madagascar, did the arrival of abelisaurs drive these giant crocs to extinction, or were they already well suited to cleaning up after the more delicate toothed theropods?