What were the dangers of the ordovician period?

Also, during the Late Ordovician, massive glaciers formed on Gondwana at the South Pole, causing shallow seas to drain and sea level to drop, which may be a factor in the period ending with a mass extinction that affected many marine communities.

1. What was dangerous about the Ordovician period?
2. What were the causes of Ordovician extinction?
3. What was life like in the Ordovician period?
4. How many species died in the Ordovician period?
5. What are fun facts about the Ordovician period?
6. What was Earth like 450 million years ago?
7. What happened Cambrian explosion?
8. What animals lived in the Ordovician period?
9. What caused the Ordovician ice age?
10. What was the worst mass extinction?
11. What caused the 3rd mass extinction?
12. What can cause extinction?
13. What animals survived the Ordovician extinction?
14. What was the most dominant animal in the Ordovician period?
15. What type of organisms were dominant after the Ordovician extinction?

What was dangerous about the Ordovician period?

These first steps toward life on land were cut short by the freezing conditions that gripped the planet toward the end of the Ordovician. This resulted in the second largest mass extinction of all time, wiping out at least half of all marine animal species about 443 million years ago.

What were the causes of Ordovician extinction?

Around 443 million years ago, 85% of all species on Earth went extinct in the Ordovician-Silurian extinction. The extinction was a most likely a result of global cooling and reduced sea levels, which dramatically impacted the many marine species living in warm, shallow coastal waters.

What was life like in the Ordovician period?

Ordovician seas were filled with a diverse assemblage of invertebrates, dominated by brachiopods (lamp shells), bryozoans (moss animals), trilobites, mollusks, echinoderms (a group of spiny-skinned marine invertebrates), and graptolites (small, colonial, planktonic animals).

How many species died in the Ordovician period?

The series of extinctions that occurred during the Ordovician and Silurian periods between 445 and 415 million years ago wiped out as much as 85 percent of all animal species on Earth.

What are fun facts about the Ordovician period?

The first evidence of land plants also appeared. Trilobites in the Ordovician were very different from their predecessors in the Cambrian. Many trilobites developed bizarre spines and nodules to defend against predators such as primitive sharks and nautiloids. Other trilobites evolved to become swimming forms.

What was Earth like 450 million years ago?

450 million years ago

The seas are diverse and the first coral reefs have emerged. Algae is the only multicellular plant, and there is still no complex life on land. Invertebrates, namely molluscs and arthropods, dominated the oceans.

What happened Cambrian explosion?

Cambrian explosion, the unparalleled emergence of organisms between 541 million and approximately 530 million years ago at the beginning of the Cambrian Period. The event was characterized by the appearance of many of the major phyla (between 20 and 35) that make up modern animal life.

What animals lived in the Ordovician period?

Ordovician Radiation

Animals include, from left: Cystoids, jawless fish (Sacabambaspis) captured by a large cephalopod (Endoceras), Rugose corals, brachiopods, trilobite, gastropod (Cyclonema), a sea star and coiled cephalopod. Jellies, small nautiloids & graptolites (Orthograptus) are seen to the left.

What caused the Ordovician ice age?

New research led by scientists from Oxford University and Exeter University has shown that the invasion of the land by plants in the Ordovician Period (488-443 million years ago) cooled the climate and triggered a series of ice ages.

What was the worst mass extinction?

Permian-triassic Extinction: 250 million years ago

The largest mass extinction event in Earth's history affected a range of species, including many vertebrates.

What caused the 3rd mass extinction?

New research shows the "Great Dying" was caused by global warming that left ocean animals unable to breathe. The largest extinction in Earth's history marked the end of the Permian period, some 252 million years ago.

What can cause extinction?

There are five major causes of extinction: habitat loss, an introduced species, pollution, population growth, and overconsumption.

What animals survived the Ordovician extinction?

All of the major animal groups of the Ordovician oceans survived, including trilobites, brachiopods, corals, crinoids and graptolites, but each lost important members. Widespread families of trilobites disappeared and graptolites came close to total extinction.

What was the most dominant animal in the Ordovician period?

The cephalopods became the dominant predators of this period. Cephalopods are a group of mollusks that are related to octopus and squid. The orthoceras was a straight-shelled cephalopod that lived in the largest open end of its shell. Its feet came out of its head!

What type of organisms were dominant after the Ordovician extinction?

By the latest age of the Early Ordovician Epoch, trilobites and other organisms dominant in the Cambrian were replaced by a wide range of other marine invertebrates, including corals, bryozoans, brachiopods, mollusks, echinoderms, graptolites, and conodonts.