For along time crossopterygian fish were beleaved to be extinct.
In 1938 a fisherman trawling off near South Africa caught a very unusual fish which was proven to be a living coelacanth,a crossopterygian fish which was only known from fossils dating back one-hundred-million years.
This small class contains some of the more odd prehistoric fish known almost very well from the booming fossil record. The members of this order are known as lobe-finned fish due to the unusual shape of their fins. The tail has three-lobes, and the body has hard scales. they are cartiligionous. These fish have lungs! But they are either so very heavily calcified that they do nouthing.
In 1999 a separate species of crossoperygii was discovered off the coast of Indonesia. |
