Most frogs prefer a diet of flies, snails1 and - if they're feeling adventurous2 - an occasional minnow.
But if you weigh 10lb and resemble a squashed beach ball, it's not surprising if your appetite stretches to something more filling.
According to fossil experts, the Beelzebufo frog, newly-discovered on the island of Madagascar, dined on baby dinosaurs3.
Beelzebufo - or "frog from hell" - terrorised prehistoric4 Earth during the dying days of the dinosaurs more than 70 million years ago.
At 16in long, it was twice the size of the largest frogs alive today and one of the largest ever discovered.
Professor Susan Evans, of University College London, who identified it, said: "This frog is a relative of today's horned toads5.
"If it shared their aggressive temperament6, it would have been a formidable predator7 on small animals. It might even have eaten hatchling or juvenile8 dinosaurs."
The discovery of the frog, reported Tuesday in the journal Proceedings9 of the National Academy of Science, is forcing fossil experts to think again about how the continents used to be connected.
Madagascar split from Africa around 160 million years ago but remained connected to India, South America, Antarctica and Australia.
It was thought that Madagascar and India broke away from the other continents around 120 million years ago, while Madagascar went its own way around 88 million years ago.
However, the giant frog finding suggests that a land bridge between Madagascar and South America remained until late into the dinosaur age
1 snails [sneɪls] 第8级 | |
n.蜗牛;迟钝的人;蜗牛( snail的名词复数 ) | |
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2 adventurous [ədˈventʃərəs] 第9级 | |
adj.爱冒险的;惊心动魄的,惊险的,刺激的 | |
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3 dinosaurs ['daɪnəsɔ:z] 第7级 | |
n.恐龙( dinosaur的名词复数 );守旧落伍的人,过时落后的东西 | |
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4 prehistoric [ˌpri:hɪˈstɒrɪk] 第8级 | |
adj.(有记载的)历史以前的,史前的,古老的 | |
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5 toads [təudz] 第8级 | |
n.蟾蜍,癞蛤蟆( toad的名词复数 ) | |
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6 temperament [ˈtemprəmənt] 第7级 | |
n.气质,性格,性情 | |
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7 predator [ˈpredətə(r)] 第9级 | |
n.捕食其它动物的动物;捕食者 | |
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8 juvenile [ˈdʒu:vənaɪl] 第8级 | |
n.青少年,少年读物;adj.青少年的,幼稚的 | |
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9 proceedings [prə'si:diŋz] 第7级 | |
n.进程,过程,议程;诉讼(程序);公报 | |
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