Jurassic Museum of Asturias The museum displays and collections cover 3,500 million years, and although they emphasize the three stages of the Mesozoic (Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous), information is also presented on the preceding and subsequent periods. Different stages of the Jurassic geologic period and system are on display. Corridors contain over 20 dinosaur replicas; measuring over in height, their weight would exceed ten tons if the replicas were real. A rich collection of footprints and fossils found in the Asturian Jurassic coastline from ten paleontological sites are exhibited in the exposition halls and are said to be "the most complete informative and representative
Insect vertebrates could have been another factor. Most extinct orders of insects developed during the Permian period that began around 270 million years ago. Many of the early groups became extinct during the Permian-Triassic extinction event, the largest mass extinction in the history of the Earth, around 252 million years ago. The remarkably successful Hymenoptera appeared as long as 146 million years ago in the Cretaceous period, but achieved their wide diversity more recently in the Cenozoic era, which began 66 million years ago. A number of highly successful insect groups evolved in conjunction with flowering plants, a powerful illustration of