Читать книгу Oceans For Dummies - Joseph Kraynak - Страница 56

Earth’s climate continued to get hotter and drier during the Permian period (298.9 to 251.9 million years ago). The seas were mostly still warm and shallow, and ocean life was similar to that of the Carboniferous period. While ammonoids (early marine mollusks) became more complex, not much else really changed. Sponges and corals made reefs, Bryozoa (moss animals) emerged, fish, ammonoids, gastropods, brachiopods, and echinoderms were still common.

All was hunky-dory till about 252 million years ago, when the Permian period ended with “the Great Dying” — Earth’s most extreme extinction event ever. Ninety-six percent of all marine species and 70 percent of all terrestrial species were wiped off the planet. Talk about a sad ending! This mass extinction event was most likely caused by one or more of the following:

 Climate change due to a mass release of methane into the atmosphere from the oceans

 Volcanic activity/eruptions in Siberia

 A really big rock slamming into the Earth (a large crater matching the age of this event has been found near the Falkland Islands off the coast of Argentina)

And on that happy note, we come to the end of the Paleozoic era … but think about all the good times we had: the diversity of life-forms exploded, plants and animals spread from sea to land, and everyone’s favorite super-continent, Pangea, was formed. It also set the stage for … wait for it …