Dinosaur mass extinction: what caused it, which dinosaurs went extinct, and how mammals survived<\/a><\/strong><\/li>
Why did dinosaurs get so big?<\/a><\/strong><\/li>
Five British dinosaurs you’ve (probably) never heard of<\/a><\/strong><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div>
Second, that oxygen is toxic at high concentrations (especially to aquatic larvae), so growing larger diluted the effects of the gas. And third, that insects<\/a> were at the top of the airborne food-chain in a time before birds. Lacking any serious predators, they grew large, just like wetas in predator-free New Zealand, elephant birds on Madagascar<\/a> <\/strong>and tortoises on the Gal\u00e1pagos.<\/a><\/p>
Biggest insects in the world, from a 60cm-long stick insect to a hefty 100g beetle larva<\/a><\/li><\/ul>
Main image: Computer artwork of giant Meganeura resting on a log in a forest, during the Carboniferous period. \u00a9 Mark Garlick\/Getty Images <\/em><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n
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Richard Jones explains just why prehistoric insects were so large… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":42585,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"< 1"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/10\/prehistoric-insects-were-absolutely-massive-an-entomologist-explains-why-they-needed-to-be-so-darn-big.jpg",2008,1493,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/10\/prehistoric-insects-were-absolutely-massive-an-entomologist-explains-why-they-needed-to-be-so-darn-big-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/10\/prehistoric-insects-were-absolutely-massive-an-entomologist-explains-why-they-needed-to-be-so-darn-big-300x223.jpg",300,223,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/10\/prehistoric-insects-were-absolutely-massive-an-entomologist-explains-why-they-needed-to-be-so-darn-big-768x571.jpg",768,571,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/10\/prehistoric-insects-were-absolutely-massive-an-entomologist-explains-why-they-needed-to-be-so-darn-big-1024x761.jpg",800,595,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/10\/prehistoric-insects-were-absolutely-massive-an-entomologist-explains-why-they-needed-to-be-so-darn-big-1536x1142.jpg",1536,1142,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/10\/prehistoric-insects-were-absolutely-massive-an-entomologist-explains-why-they-needed-to-be-so-darn-big.jpg",2008,1493,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Richard Jones explains just why prehistoric insects were so large...","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/42584"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}