Mammals learn to glide
A furry insect-eater spreads a membrane between its limbs and glides between Jurassic trees.
- When
- Known to
- ± 3 million years
- Era
- Jurassic, Mesozoic
Volaticotherium antiquum, roughly contemporary with Castorocauda, preserves a gliding membrane stretched between its limbs and a tail — the earliest known gliding mammal, and by some 70 million years the oldest evidence of any mammal leaving the ground. It is unrelated to modern flying squirrels or colugos, making it an independent invention of the same solution.