Jurassic plesiosaurs deliberately swam to shore to vomit up prey, 160-million-year-old fossils reveal
From the Newshound archive · first published 23 September 2026 · last updated 24 September 2026.
Over twenty chunks of fossilised regurgitate recovered from North Sea drill cores suggest that plesiosaurs — the long-necked marine reptiles of the Jurassic era — deliberately travelled into shallower coastal waters to expel the indigestible remains of prey. Dr Dirk Knaust, a palaeontologist at Norwegian energy firm Equinor ASA, came across the material while recording data from core samples taken from wells near the Troll gas and oil field. The study, published in the journal Geological Magazine, established that the location would have been a river delta during the Jurassic period, confirming that the animals actively headed shoreward after feeding.
The fossilised pellets range from walnut to mango in size and contain compacted bivalve shells, worm casings, crinoids and squid-like belemnites.
The fossils came to light during the development of a subsea carbon dioxide storage site situated around 30 miles from the Norwegian coast.
The discovery suggests plesiosaurs shared a behaviour seen in modern predators such as owls, which regurgitate indigestible material as pellets.