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The Earth has been around for a really long while. Not all of what happened in its past was recorded in writing, so it is kind of hard to tell what happened in the very early stages of the planet. That’s the time where dinosaurs still roamed the land and lots of exotic ancient species thrived.

The period before history was ever recorded, known as pre-history, relies on fossils and other artifacts derived from rock layers. To discover ancient species of animals, scientists look for bones usually. During an exploration, usually, only parts of bones are discovered. As scientists dig deeper into the ground and search further across the land, they find out more and more bones. Eventually, the collection of bones can be pieced together to have a rough idea of how prehistoric creatures looked like.

For smaller animals, fossilized remains would be the key. Ancient insects, for example, can be studied through digging out their bodies from amber, which itself is fossilized remains of prehistoric plants. An interesting thing about insects in amber is that their bodies are almost perfectly preserved. In fact, some mosquitoes found in amber still bore some blood inside of them, untouched and unharmed.

Some fossils do not necessarily include parts of the bodies of ancient animals and plants. They can be as simple as footprints or leaf prints left on rock. If the contours marked on the rock well enough, the shapes of those prehistoric life forms can be determined. Some comparative studies can also be done with today’s species, to see if there are any similarities between them.

Prehistory does not involve a lot of humans since in the land before time, there were hardly any human beings living on Earth. Because of this, a lot of prehistory is all about the plants, animals, and landscapes of our planet before we came in.