Coil, a brown cartoon snake, and Bask, a green and beige cartoon croc, happily look toward the black on white Common Descent Podcast Title banner.

Tag: Reptiles

  • Episode 246 – Gharials

    Episode 246 – Gharials

    Listen to Episode 246 on Podbean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    Most living crocodilian species are overall pretty similar in their appearance, but one group really stands out with their bulging eyes and incredibly slender snouts. This episode, we investigate just what’s going on with Gharials.

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  • Episode 244 – Sea Turtles

    Episode 244 – Sea Turtles

    Listen to Episode 244 on Podbean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    They’re the one lineage carrying on the legacy of the giant Mesozoic marine reptiles. This episode, we explore the modern and fossil diversity of Sea Turtles.

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  • Episode 221 – Legless Lizards

    Episode 221 – Legless Lizards

    Listen to Episode 221 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    Reptiles are the absolute champions of evolving snake-shaped bodies. This episode, we explore the lifestyles and evolution of the extraordinary variety of Legless Lizards.

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  • Episode 220 – Terrestrial Crocs

    Episode 220 – Terrestrial Crocs

    Listen to Episode 220 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    Today’s crocs are iconic semi-aquatic predators, but their extended evolutionary history includes repeated ventures into land-based lifestyles. This episode, we explore the many faces of Terrestrial Crocs.

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  • Episode 196 – Boas and Pythons

    Episode 196 – Boas and Pythons

    Listen to Episode 196 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    Two groups of snakes include some the most famous and most awesome species on the planet. This episode, we discuss the diversity and evolutionary history of Boas and Pythons.

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  • Episode 194 – Alligators and Caimans

    Episode 194 – Alligators and Caimans

    Listen to Episode 194 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    They’re one half of the modern crocodilian family tree, and they’ve got an extensive and diverse fossil record going back to the Cretaceous. This episode, we explore Alligators and Caimans.

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  • Episode 169 – Sea Snakes

    Episode 169 – Sea Snakes

    Listen to Episode 169 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    Snakes have adapted surprisingly well to marine life, evolving a host of aquatic adaptations several times across many millions of years. This episode, we discuss the repeated evolution of Sea Snakes.

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  • Episode 168 – Marine Crocs

    Episode 168 – Marine Crocs

    Listen to Episode 168 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    Several times throughout the ages, various branches of the crocodylomorph family tree have moved into the sea. This episode, we discuss the many forms of Marine Crocs.

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  • Episode 143 – Monitor Lizards

    Episode 143 – Monitor Lizards

    Listen to Episode 143 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    These lizards are famous for their diverse lifestyles, their widely-ranging body sizes, and their somewhat mysterious evolutionary past. This episode, we discuss Monitor Lizards.

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  • Episode 142 – Phytosaurs

    Episode 142 – Phytosaurs

    Listen to Episode 142 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!

    Travel back in time to the Late Triassic, and the waters were home to animals you’d easily mistake for crocs. This episode, we discuss the fossil record, lifestyles, and uncanny croc-ness of Phytosaurs.

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  • Episode 116 – Ichthyosaurs

    Episode 116 – Ichthyosaurs

    Listen to Episode 116 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever else you can find it!

    Of all the reptiles to evolve marine lifestyles, only one were so strikingly specialized to earn the name “fish reptiles.” This episode, we discuss the long evolutionary history, extraordinary adaptations, diverse lifestyles, and perplexing extinction of Ichthyosaurs.

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  • Episode 79 – Pterosaurs

    Listen to Episode 79 on PodBean, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts!

    Around the same time that the first dinosaurs were walking around, another group of reptiles was doing something no vertebrates had ever done before: taking flight. For more than 150 million years, they ruled the skies, and we’ve spent the last 200 years or so learning ever more about just how bizarre and fascinating they were. This episode, we talk Pterosaurs.

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