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Description
My friend gave me some suggestions for prehistoric animals to have a go at drawing recently, and I chose my two favourite ones from the list she provided - a Anomalocaris and a Hallucigenia. Seen as I'm not very well versed when it comes to animal biology in general (nevermind prehistoric ones! ), it's interesting to learn more about creatures I'm unfamiliar with this way.

Anomalocaris, as well as being the animal that the Pokemon Anorith is based off of , has a name that means 'abnormal shrimp' - an extinct genus of radiodont (Cambrian arthropods) growing up to at least a metre long, who is thought to have been one of the earliest examples of an apex predator, discovered in the Burgess Shale in the Canadian Rockies by Joseph Fredeerick Whiteaves, with more examples found by Charles Doolittle Walcott. Several fossilized parts discovered separately (the mouth, frontal appendages and trunk) were thought to be three separate creatures at first!
Hallucigenia were a genus of Cambrian xenusiids (lobopodian worms - referring to their stubby legs being named lobopods) known from articulated fossils in Burgess Shale-like deposits in Canada and China, and from isolated spines around the world. Only growing to about 0.5 - 5.5 cm, they're thought to be an ancestor of velvet worms by some researchers while others think they're more related to arthropods, and were also discovered by Charles Doolittle Walcott. (And I think they'd also make a great inspiration for a Pokemon in the future. )

Seen as they were both around in the Cambrian period, I decided to draw the two of them together acting chummy.

Description
My friend gave me some suggestions for prehistoric animals to have a go at drawing recently, and I chose my two favourite ones from the list she provided - a Anomalocaris and a Hallucigenia. Seen as I'm not very well versed when it comes to animal biology in general (nevermind prehistoric ones! ), it's interesting to learn more about creatures I'm unfamiliar with this way.

Anomalocaris, as well as being the animal that the Pokemon Anorith is based off of , has a name that means 'abnormal shrimp' - an extinct genus of radiodont (Cambrian arthropods) growing up to at least a metre long, who is thought to have been one of the earliest examples of an apex predator, discovered in the Burgess Shale in the Canadian Rockies by Joseph Fredeerick Whiteaves, with more examples found by Charles Doolittle Walcott. Several fossilized parts discovered separately (the mouth, frontal appendages and trunk) were thought to be three separate creatures at first!
Hallucigenia were a genus of Cambrian xenusiids (lobopodian worms - referring to their stubby legs being named lobopods) known from articulated fossils in Burgess Shale-like deposits in Canada and China, and from isolated spines around the world. Only growing to about 0.5 - 5.5 cm, they're thought to be an ancestor of velvet worms by some researchers while others think they're more related to arthropods, and were also discovered by Charles Doolittle Walcott. (And I think they'd also make a great inspiration for a Pokemon in the future. )

Seen as they were both around in the Cambrian period, I decided to draw the two of them together acting chummy.