Beast Mode: Deep Time Science Exploration
Beast
Mode
The Deep Time Puzzle
500 million years of prehistoric life — tessellated into one ~50-piece wooden puzzle. Meet the creatures that ruled ancient Earth, long before humans ever walked it. Art not to scale. :)
The Puzzle
Every Piece
Tells a Story
Beast Mode is a puzzle that's designed to open a window into deep time. Each interlocking wooden piece represents a real creature from Earth's prehistoric past, arranged so they fit together perfectly. Artist Jason Panda took some artistic liberties with relative scale so that the pieces fit together in a giant evolutionary tessellation.
Tessellations are shapes designed to fit with no gaps and no overlaps.
Did You Know?
Survival of the Fittest
Synapsids live on as every mammal on Earth — including you. Marine reptile lineages survive as sea turtles and sea snakes. And birds are living, breathing dinosaurs.
14 Prehistoric Species
Meet the Creatures
Who's Who?
Eras of Deep Time
The creatures in Beast Mode belong to different branches of the prehistoric family tree. They didn't all live at the same time — but they all shared one home: Earth.
Synapsids
Long before the first dinosaur took a step, synapsids were running the show. Dimetrodon — the sail-backed predator in your puzzle — was the apex predator of the Permian. These animals are actually your distant ancestors: every mammal alive today (including you!) is a synapsid.
Spot the difference: synapsids have one opening in the skull behind the eye. Dinosaurs have two.
Marine Reptiles
While dinosaurs ruled the land, giant reptiles owned the ocean. Elasmosaurus had a neck longer than a school bus; Archelon was a turtle the size of a car. These were separate groups that independently evolved to live in the sea — just as whales later evolved from land mammals.
Marine reptiles aren't dinosaurs. They evolved to live in the water independently, not because they descended from dinosaurs.
Dinosaurs & Relatives
Here's the big secret: dinosaurs are not extinct. Birds are living dinosaurs. The puzzle also includes Cryodrakon boreas — a pterosaur, a flying reptile that's a close cousin of dinosaurs but in its own separate group. Together they ruled land and sky for over 165 million years.
Spot the difference: dinosaurs have an upright stance — legs straight down, not splayed to the side like a lizard.
Special Guest: Dunkleosteus — the Devonian Wildcard
Dunkleosteus doesn't fit neatly into the three groups above — because it predates all of them. This armored predator fish lived 380 million years ago during the Devonian Period, tens of millions of years before the first synapsid evolved. It's a reminder that remarkable life existed on Earth long before the "age of giants" that most people think of as prehistory. Consider it the puzzle's bonus mystery piece.
Mind-Blowing Science
Did You Know...?
You Are a Synapsid
Dimetrodon is more closely related to you than it is to T-Rex. Synapsids are the group that eventually gave rise to all mammals — meaning every dog, whale, bat, and human alive today is a synapsid. The sail-backed predator in your puzzle is your extremely distant cousin.
The World's Largest Turtle
Archelon measured over 4 metres from nose to tail and weighed more than a family car. It's the largest turtle that has ever lived — and it's proof that sea turtles have been patrolling the world's oceans for at least 70 million years.
Birds ARE Dinosaurs
Biologically, birds are classified as avian dinosaurs. When a crow lands nearby, you're watching a direct descendant of animals like Spinosaurus. There are over 10,000 species of living dinosaurs on Earth right now. Non-avian dinosaurs went extinct; dinosaurs did not.
380 Million Years of Terror
Dunkleosteus had no teeth — just interlocking blades of bone that regrew continuously. Its jaws could open and close in under 1/50th of a second, generating bite forces that rival modern great white sharks. It ruled the Devonian seas for millions of years before going extinct in a mass die-off event.
Quick Reference
The Survival Scoreboard
All three main groups of Beast Mode creatures are technically still alive today. Can you find their modern descendants?
| Group | In This Puzzle | Peak Era | Still Here Today? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Synapsids | Dimetrodon | Permian 295–252 Ma |
✅ As all mammals (including humans) |
| Marine Reptiles | Elasmosaurus, Archelon | Jurassic & Cretaceous 201–66 Ma |
✅ Partly — as sea turtles & sea snakes |
| Dinosaurs | 9 species + Cryodrakon (pterosaur) | Jurassic & Cretaceous 233–66 Ma |
✅ As birds — 10,000+ species today |
| Devonian Fish | Dunkleosteus | Devonian 380–360 Ma |
❌ Went extinct — but gave rise to modern jawed fish |
🍁 Made in Canada
Found Right Here
Three of the creatures in this puzzle were discovered in Canada — including two right here in Alberta, where Telus Spark calls home.
Alberta's own apex predator — named after the province where its fossils were first found. This smaller relative of T-Rex hunted the ancient wetlands and forests of what is now Drumheller country, and may have chased prey in coordinated packs.
Discovered in the Dinosaur Park Formation in Alberta, Cryodrakon boreas means "cold dragon of the north." With a 10-metre wingspan, it soared over what is now southern Alberta — one of the largest flying animals that has ever existed.
A Canadian species — Dimetrodon borealis — was found in PEI. It lived 40 million years before the first dinosaur, when PEI sat closer to the equator. A reminder that Canada's prehistoric story stretches far beyond Alberta's badlands.
Keep Exploring
Want to Go Deeper?
Royal Tyrrell Museum
Home to Albertasaurus specimens and one of the world's greatest dinosaur fossil collections, in Drumheller, Alberta — a 90-minute drive from Spark.
Dinosaur Provincial Park
A UNESCO World Heritage Site in Alberta where Cryodrakon boreas fossils were found. One of the richest dinosaur fossil sites on the planet.
Joggins Fossil Cliffs
Nova Scotia's UNESCO site preserves a 300-million-year-old forest floor from the Carboniferous — the era just before the synapsids in your puzzle took over.
What is Tessellation?
Tessellation means shapes that lock together perfectly with no gaps or overlaps. Honeycombs do it, bathroom tiles do it — and now prehistoric creatures do it too.
Prehistoric Planet
Apple TV's nature documentary uses cutting-edge palaeontology to show what these animals may really have looked like — feathers, colours, behaviour and all.
Visit Telus Spark
The science in this puzzle connects directly to exhibits at Telus Spark Science Centre in Calgary. How many connections can you spot on your next visit?
Available Now
Find Your Piece
of Prehistory
Beast Mode is a Spark × StumpCraft wooden puzzle designed to spark curiosity and connect families through science.