NZ living fossil once lived in Argentina, according to New Scientist, 11 October 2003, p17. The Tuatara lizard lives on some small islands in New Zealand and is considered the only living member of a group of reptiles named Sphenodontians, which once lived in North America and Europe but have been extinct for 100 million years. South American palaeontologists have found numerous fossil Sphenodontians in the Candeleros Formation in northwest Patagonia buried with crocodiles, snakes, turtles, Theropod and Sauropod dinosaurs, mammals and fishes. Some of the fossils were a metre (3 ft) long – the largest Sphenodontians ever found, and twice the size of living Tuataras.
Editorial Comment: The political implications are interesting, i.e. there are no such things as indigenous plants, animals or people. The scientific aspects are also worth noting. These fossils indicate the history of Sphenodontians is they started out as many varieties of large animals which are now reduced to one small species. This is the opposite of evolution, but it fits the Biblical history of life, i.e. creation of many kinds, followed by death and degeneration. The fossils were buried with a mixture of land and water dwelling creatures – evidence that the rock formation they were in, was formed by a massive flood sweeping across many environments, collecting a huge array of living creatures, mixing them up and dumping them. (Ref. Sphenodontians, Tuatara, fossil)