Sandstone rock from Triassic age.
The 'Triassic' is a
geologic period that extends from about 251 ± 0.4 to 199.6 ± 0.6
Ma (million years ago). As the first period of the
Mesozoic Era, the Triassic follows the
Permian and is followed by the
Jurassic. Both the start and end of the Triassic are marked by major
extinction events. The extinction event that closed the Triassic period has recently been more accurately dated, but as with most older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the start and end are well identified, but the exact dates of the start and end of the period are uncertain by a few million years.
During the Triassic, both marine and continental life show an
adaptive radiation beginning from the starkly impoverished
biosphere that followed the
Permian-Triassic extinction. Corals of the
hexacorallia group made their first appearance. The first flowering plants (
Angiosperms) may have evolved during the Triassic, as did the first flying vertebrates, the
pterosaurs.
Dating and subdivisions
The Triassic was named in 1834 by
Friedrich Von Alberti from the three distinct layers (Latin ''trias'' meaning ) —
red beds, capped by
chalk, followed by black
shales— that are found throughout
Germany and northwest
Europe, called the 'Trias'.
The Triassic is usually separated into
Early,
Middle, and
Late Triassic Epochs, and the corresponding rocks are referred to as Lower, Middle, or Upper Triassic. The
faunal stages from the youngest to oldest are:
Paleogeography
During the Triassic, almost all the Earth's land mass was concentrated into a single
supercontinent centered more or less on the equator, called
Pangaea ("all the land"). This took the form of a giant "
Pac-Man" with an east-facing "mouth" constituting the
Tethys sea, a vast gulf that opened farther westward in the mid-Triassic, at the expense of the shrinking
Paleo-Tethys Ocean, an ocean that existed during the
Paleozoic. The remainder was the world-ocean known as
Panthalassa ("all the sea"). All the deep-ocean sediments laid down during the Triassic have disappeared through
subduction of oceanic plates; thus, very little is known of the Triassic open ocean.
The supercontinent Pangaea was rifting during the Triassic—especially late in the period—but had not yet separated. The first nonmarine sediments in the
rift that marks the initial break-up of Pangea—which separated
New Jersey from
Morocco—are of Late Triassic age; in the U.S., these thick sediments comprise the
Newark Group.
[1] Because of the limited shoreline of one super-continental mass, Triassic marine deposits are globally relatively rare, despite their prominence in
Western Europe, where the Triassic was first studied. In
North America, for example, marine deposits are limited to a few exposures in the west. Thus Triassic
stratigraphy is mostly based on organisms living in lagoons and hypersaline environments, such as ''
Estheria'' crustaceans.
Climate
The Triassic climate was generally hot and dry, forming typical
red bed sandstones and
evaporites. There is no evidence of
glaciation at or near either pole; in fact, the polar regions were apparently moist and
temperate, a climate suitable for reptile-like creatures. Pangaea's large size limited the moderating effect of the global ocean; its
continental climate was highly seasonal, with very hot summers and cold winters.
[2] It probably had strong,
cross-
equatorial monsoons.
[2]
Life
Three categories of organisms can be distinguished in the Triassic record: holdovers from the
Permian-Triassic extinction, new groups which flourished briefly, and other new groups which went on to dominate the
Mesozoic world. The climate was also very dry and hot and many dinosaurs had to adapt to the climate.
In
marine environments, new modern types of
corals appeared in the Early Triassic, forming small patches of
reefs of modest extent compared to the great reef systems of
Devonian times or modern reefs. The shelled
cephalopods called
Ammonites recovered, diversifying from a single line that survived the Permian extinction. The fish fauna was remarkably uniform, reflecting the fact that very few families survived the Permian extinction. There were also many types of marine reptiles. These included the
Sauropterygia, which featured
pachypleurosaurs and
nothosaurs (both common during the Middle Triassic, especially in the
Tethys region),
placodonts, and the first
plesiosaurs; the first of the lizardlike
Thalattosauria (
Askeptosaurs); and the highly successful
ichthyosaurs, which appeared in Early Triassic seas and soon diversified, some eventually developing to huge size during the late Triassic.
On land, the holdover plants included the
lycophytes, the dominant
cycads,
ginkgophyta (represented in modern times by ''
Ginkgo biloba'') and
glossopterids. The
Spermatophytes, or seed plants came to dominate the terrestrial flora: in the northern hemisphere,
conifers flourished. ''
Glossopteris'' (a
seed fern) was the dominant southern hemisphere tree during the Early Triassic period.
Temnospondyl amphibians were among those groups that survived the P-T extinction, some lineages (e.g. Trematosaurs) flourishing briefly in the Early Triassic, while others (e.g.
Capitosaurs) remained successful throughout the whole period, or only came to prominence in the Late Triassic (e.g.
Plagiosaurs,
Metoposaurs). As for other amphibians, the first
Lissamphibia are known from the Early Triassic, but the group as a whole did not become common until the
Jurassic, when the temnospondyls had become very rare.
Archosauromorph reptiles — especially
archosaurs — progressively replaced the
synapsids that had dominated the Permian. Although ''
Cynognathus'' was a characteristic top predator in earlier Triassic (
Olenekian and
Anisian)
Gondwana, and both
Kannemeyeriid dicynodonts and
gomphodont cynodonts remained important
herbivores during much of the period. By the end of the Triassic, synapsids played only bit parts. During the
Carnian (early part of the Late Triassic), some advanced cynodont gave rise to the first mammals. At the same time the
Ornithodira, which until then had been small and insignificant, evolved into
pterosaurs and a variety of
dinosaurs. The
Crurotarsi were the other important archosaur
clade, and during the Late Triassic these also reached the height of their diversity, with various groups including the
Phytosaurs,
Aetosaurs, several distinct lineages of
Rauisuchia, and the first
crocodylians (the
Sphenosuchia). Meanwhile the stocky herbivorous
rhynchosaurs and the small to medium-sized insectivorous or piscivorous
Prolacertiformes were important
basal archosauromorph groups throughout most of the Triassic.
Among other reptiles, the earliest
turtles, like ''
Proganochelys'' and ''
Proterochersis'', appeared during the
Norian (middle of the Late Triassic). The
Lepidosauromorpha—specifically the
Sphenodontia—are first known in the fossil record a little earlier (during the Carnian). The
Procolophonidae were an important group of small lizard-like herbivores.
Lagerstätten
The
Monte San Giorgio lagerstätte, now in the
Lake Lugano region of northern
Italy and
Switzerland, was in Triassic times a
lagoon behind reefs with an anoxic bottom layer, so there were no scavengers and little turbulence to disturb fossilization, a situation that can be compared to the better-known Jurassic
Solnhofen limestone lagerstätte. The remains of fish and various marine reptiles (including the common
pachypleurosaur ''
Neusticosaurus'', and the bizarre long-necked archosauromorph ''
Tanystropheus''), along with some terrestrial forms like ''
Ticinosuchus'' and ''
Macrocnemus'', have been recovered from this locality. All these fossils date from the
Anisian/
Ladinian transition (about 237 million years ago).
Late Triassic extinction event
The Triassic period ended with a mass extinction, which was particularly severe in the oceans; the
conodonts disappeared, and all the marine reptiles except ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs. Invertebrates like
brachiopods,
gastropods, and
molluscs were severely affected. In the oceans, 22% of marine families and possibly about half of marine genera went missing, according to
University of Chicago paleontologist
Jack Sepkoski.
Though the end-Triassic extinction event was not equally devastating everywhere in terrestrial ecosystems, several important clades of
Crurotarsi (large archosaurian reptiles previously grouped together as the
thecodonts) disappeared, as did most of the large labyrinthodont amphibians, groups of small reptiles, and some synapsids (except for the proto-mammals). Some of the early, primitive dinosaurs also went extinct, but other more adaptive dinosaurs survived to evolve in the Jurassic. Surviving plants that went on to dominate the Mesozoic world included modern conifers and cycadeoids.
It is not certain what caused this Late Triassic extinction, which was accompanied by huge
volcanic eruptions about 208-213 million years ago, the largest recorded volcanic event since the planet cooled and stabilized, as the supercontinent Pangaea began to break apart. Other possible causes for the extinction events include global cooling or even a
bolide impact, for which an impact crater surrounding
Manicouagan Reservoir in
Quebec,
Canada, has been singled out. At the Manicouagan impact crater, however, recent research has shown that the impact melt within the crater has an age of 214±1 Ma. The date of the Triassic-Jurassic boundary has also been more accurately fixed recently, at 202±1 Ma. Both dates are gaining accuracy by using more accurate forms of radiometric dating, in particular the decay of uranium to lead in zircons formed at the impact. So the evidence suggests the Manicouagan impact preceded the end of the Triassic by approximately 12±2 Ma. Therefore it could not be the immediate cause of the observed mass extinction.
[4]
The number of Late Triassic extinctions is disputed. Some studies suggest that there are at least two periods of extinction towards the end of the Triassic, between 12 and 17 million years apart. But arguing against this is a recent study of North American faunas. In the
Petrified Forest of northeast Arizona there is a unique sequence of latest Carnian-early Norian terrestrial sediments. An
analysis in 2002 found no significant change in the paleoenvironment.
[5] Phytosaurs, the most common fossils there, experienced a change-over only at the genus level, and the number of species remained the same. Some
Aetosaurs, the next most common tetrapods, and early dinosaurs, passed through unchanged. However, both Phytosaurs and Aetosaurs were among the groups of archosaur reptiles completely wiped out by the end-Triassic extinction event.
It seems likely then that there was some sort of end-Carnian extinction, when several herbivorous archosauromorph groups died out, while the large herbivorous
therapsids— the
Kannemeyeriid dicynodonts and the
Traversodont cynodonts— were much reduced in the northern half of Pangaea (
Laurasia).
These extinctions within the Triassic and at its end allowed the dinosaurs to expand into many niches that had become unoccupied. Dinosaurs became increasingly dominant, abundant and diverse, and remained that way for the next 150 million years. The true "Age of Dinosaurs" is the Jurassic and Cretaceous, rather than the Triassic.
See also
★
Geologic timescale
★
List of fossil sites ''(with link directory)''
Notes
1. http://rainbow.ldeo.columbia.edu/courses/v1001/10.html
2. Stanley, 452-3.
3. Stanley, 452-3.
4. Hodych & Dunning, 1992.
5. http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2002AM/finalprogram/abstract_42936.htm
References
★
Emiliani, Cesare, 1992, ''Planet Earth : Cosmology, Geology and the Evolution of Life and Environment''
★ Ogg, Jim; June, 2004, ''Overview of Global Boundary Stratotype Sections and Points (GSSP's)''
[1] Accessed April 30, 2006
★ Stanley, Steven M. ''Earth System History.'' New York: W.H. Freeman and Company, 1999. ISBN 0-7167-2882-6
★ van Andel, Tjeerd, (1985) 1994, ''New Views on an Old Planet : A History of Global Change'', Cambridge University Press
External links
★
Overall introduction
★
'The Triassic world'
★
Douglas Henderson's illustrations of Triassic animals
★
Paleofiles page on the Triassic extinctions
★
Examples of Triassic Fossils
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