page_title: Bergisuchus
section_title: Palaeoecology
hierarchical_section_title: Bergisuchus / Palaeobiology / Palaeoecology
caption_attribution_description: English: Skeletal reconstruction of Boverisuchus magnifrons from the Geiseltal Lagerstätte, pictured in the exhibition: Graining ground: Horse hunting crocodiles and giant birds from 6th of march to 29th of may 2015 in Halle/Saale Deutsch: Skelettrekonstruktion von Boverisuchus magnifrons aus dem Geiseltal in der Ausstellung: Aus der Morgendämmerung: Pferdejagende Krokodile und Riesenvögel vom 6. März bis 29. Mai 2015 in Halle/Saale
context_page_description: Bergisuchus is an extinct genus of small sebecosuchian mesoeucrocodylian known primarily from the Eocene Messel Pit in Germany. Few fossils of Bergisuchus have been discovered, only a single incomplete snout, a few partial lower jaws and some teeth. Despite being fragmentary, the jaw bones are enough to indicate that Bergisuchus had a short, deep, narrow snout and serrated teeth, quite unlike the broad flat snouts of modern crocodylians.
  As with other sebecosuchians, it is likely that Bergisuchus was a fast, terrestrial predator and not an aquatic ambush hunter like modern crocodylians. Its presence in Europe is also unusual, as later sebecosuchians were restricted entirely to South America, and so Bergisuchus indicates the group was once much more widespread in the early Cenozoic.
context_section_description: The Messel Pit is famous for its well-preserved fossils, which include semi-aquatic crocodylians such as Asiatosuchus and Diplocynodon. Unlike these crocodylians, Bergisuchus was a small terrestrial hypercarnivore. Rossmann and colleagues speculated extensively about the palaeoecology of Bergisuchus. They suggested that Bergisuchus did not inhabit the fluvial and lacustrine habitats around the Messel and Geiseltal sites. They interpreted the rare, fragmented material as evidence for the bones being transported into these settings from elsewhere, compared to the more abundant and more complete crocodylians from these sites that were well preserved by the local conditions. They further speculated that Bergisuchus may have inhabited drier upland regions from these lakes and rivers, potentially coexisting alongside predatory creodont mammals in the Geiseltal area and avoiding competition with the similarly terrestrial but unrelated planocraniid crocodilians like Boverisuchus.
  The reduced ziphodont dentition of Bergisuchus with large teeth concentrated at the front of the jaws is somewhat similar to that of baurusuchids such as Stratiotosuchus, which have reduced their maxillary tooth count down to only 5 teeth. This has been suggested to be a specialisation for hunting large-sized prey items by imparting more powerful bites at the very front of the jaws. This is unlike the condition of most other sebecids, which have more generalised dentitions with similarly sized teeth throughout the jaw, which may have preferred smaller to mid-sized prey. The deeper snout and less compressed, stronger teeth of Bergisuchus also suggest that it was capable of withstanding greater forces relatively than planocraniids, and is inferred to be capable of catching and dismembering prey by thrashing its head in any direction, unlike planocraniids.
  The unusual differentiated heterodont teeth were interpreted as evidence for a relatively complex method for processing food, and they suggested that Bergisuchus used the large canines at the front of the jaws as fangs and the smaller rear teeth to "chew" and process food before swallowing. They also suggested that the huge, exaggerated canines could possibly have been used as sexual signals or as weapons in intraspecific competition, rather than predation.
caption: Skeleton of the contemporary terrestrial crocodilian Boverisuchus.
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