Creatures Older Than Trees
Trilobites
These armored sea dwellers emerged over 500 million years ago—almost 100 million years before the first trees evolved.
Jellyfish
Jellyfish have roamed Earth`s oceans for over 500 million years. Their soft, simple bodies thrived long before forests ever stood.
Nautilus
This deep-sea mollusk has barely changed in 400 million years. Its spiral shell design predates trees by tens of millions of years.
Horseshoe Crabs
Often called "living fossils," horseshoe crabs date back over 450 million years—still crawling the shores before trees took root.
Sponges
Among the oldest multicellular animals, sea sponges have existed for over 600 million years, filtering water before tree roots touched soil.
Brachiopods
These shellfish look like clams but belong to a distinct lineage that thrived in Earth’s early oceans, long before plants colonized land.
Anomalocaris
A top predator of the Cambrian seas, this bizarre creature lived 100 million years before even the earliest vascular plants.