Mammals beat reptiles and birds

In the ashes of huge dinosaurs, three groups of animals began the struggle to conquer Earth.

After the meteor strike, the dinosaurs tried to reconquer the planet. The only surviving dinosaurs, birds, grew to giant sizes with strong legs and powerful jaws, and some were probably at the top of the food chain. Their scaly relatives, crocodiles, also made an attempt to become dominant. Some evolved into giants, and others became fastrunning terrestrial predators that feasted on the ancestors of mammals. Even snakes joined the battle, producing the 14-m-long Titanoboa constrictor. Each group of animals displayed an explosive evolutionary development in an effort to take over the throne left by the large dinosaurs. Nevertheless, they were all beaten by a group of small, rat-like insectivores, which very quickly developed into the wealth of different life forms that dominate the world today.