Tuataras may look like lizards, but they are more oddballs of the reptile world.
These New Zealand creatures have been carving their own evolutionary path for nearly 250 million years. The species they evolved from split off from the group that also gave rise to lizards and eventually snakes.
But what exactly makes tuataras so unique? A third eye, a strange skeletal structure, and a different approach to sex, are some traits to start with.
Tuataras are reptiles, and though they may look like lizards at first glance, they are from an entirely different branch of the Lepidosauria group. They are part of the Rhynchocephalia order, which existed in the Jurassic Period.
Fossils of the Rhynchocephalia have been found across Gondwana, an ancient supercontinent including Africa, South America, Antarctica, Arabia, the Indian subcontinent, Australia, and New Zealand that began to split apart in the Triassic Period.
Rhynchocephalia were wiped out ...
