-
570 BCE
Cambrian 570 - 500 MYA
Earliest record of marine life. Trilobites are dominant. -
500 BCE
Ordovician 500 - 435 MYA
Invertebrates are dominant, mollusks become abundant. Earliest fish that are jawless and later, jawed and armored fish. -
435 BCE
Silurian 435 - 395 MYA
Earliest terrestrial plants and animals. Tiktaalik eurypterids develop. -
395 BCE
Devonian 395 - 345 MYA
Armored fish go extinct, but an abundance of several species of fish. Earliest amphibians and ammonites -
345 BCE
Carboniferous 345 - 280 MYA
Abundant sharks and amphibians. Large swamps and coal forming forests. Earliest reptiles, scale trees and fern seeds. -
280 BCE
Permian 280 - 225 MYA
Extinction of many types of marine animals including trilobites. -
225 BCE
Triassic 225 - 195 MYA
Earliest dinosaurs, abundant cycads and conifers. -
195 BCE
Jurassic 195 - 136 MYA
Earliest birds and mammals. Abundant dinosaurs and ammonites. -
136 BCE
Cretaceous 136 - 65 MYA
Earliest flowering plants, climax of dinosaurs followed by their extinction. great decline of brachiopods. Abundance of bony fish. -
65 BCE
Tertiary 65 - 1.8 MYA
Earliest placental mammals, modern mammals, large running mammals.