Abstract

“Despite the warnings of Sebastian, during the Palaeozoic the first animals made the transition from living in the oceans to permanently living on land. Life on land was drastically different to life under the sea, and this transition was one of the most important events in our evolutionary history. In this presentation, I will examine the paleontological and ichnological records of the colonization of the continents, largely focussing on what trace fossils can tell us about when, where, and how it occurred, and how they provide different and complimentary information to body fossils. I will discuss the establishment of an array of non-marine ecosystems, and consider how the routes to land may have differed for different taxa.”