I'd like to be sleeping, 🛏️ but instead I'm reading about the #daeodon 🤷‍♂️

Today’s #megafauna is the #daeodon–a giant, pig-like mammal that lived 29-19 million years ago. Although it looks similar to a wild boar, it is not related to modern-day #pigs. At the back of its long jaw are supports for powerful muscles that would have made the daeodon’s bite force very strong–enabling it to bite through bones. The varied shape of its teeth suggests that daedon was an omnivore. Multiple #fossils have been found with daedon tooth marks scratched into their bones.

Arguments have been made that daedon was actually a carrion scavenger. Its nostrils are located on the side of the face, allowing its sense of smell to be directional–much in the same way that a human’s sense of sound is directional because one ear can hear a sound before the other does. Zigazagging fossil footprints suggest that daedon wandered around, potentially sniffing for fresh kills to scavenge.

Daedon stood about size feet tall at the shoulder and was 9 feet long, weighing in at up to 2000 lbs. Whether it scavenged meat for most of its meals or just did so as an opportunistic omnivore, daeodon’s hulking size likely helped it to withstand attacks from other #animals and conflict within its own species.