The Cretaceous World (140-65 million years ago)

During the Cretaceous Period, America continued to drift away from Europe, and the Atlantic started to become a recognisable ocean.  Conditions on the site of our Meadow became more hospitable, with lush swamps populated by dinosaurs.  Iguanodon was the most common plant-eating dinosaur during the early Cretaceous period.

In this picture a herd of Iguanodon walk through the marshy forests that might have been covering the Meadow at this time. Mid-way through the period earth movements deep under south-west England tilted the rocks to the east.  Then, as the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean expanded, a vast sea developed over the area.  Within the clear, warm waters billions of microscopic algae bloomed, and their skeletons sank to the sea floor to form the pure, white Chalk which lies below our feet today.

Artist's impression of an Early Cretaceous (144 to 90 million years ago) landscape, with Iguanodon

The Cretaceous is the time when some of the largest and most fearsome dinosaurs walked the Earth and is also the period when the first flowering plants evolved.  The end of the Cretaceous is critical to the shape of the modern world.  A mass extinction took place which brought to an end the reign of the reptiles as the dominant life on Earth.  The dinosaurs, great marine reptiles and the ammonites were amongst the species which became extinct.  The world that followed saw the present style of life on Earth emerge, dominated by mammals, flowering plants and grasses.