Prehistoric predator: Weighing 10lb, the newly-discovered 'frog from hell' would have devoured tiny dinosaurs

Most frogs prefer a diet of flies, snails and - if they're feeling adventurous - an occasional minnow.

But if you weigh 10lb and resemble a squashed beach ball, it's not surprising if your appetite stretches to something more filling.

According to fossil experts, the Beelzebufo frog, newly-discovered on the island of Madagascar, dined on baby dinosaurs.

Beelzebufo - or "frog from hell" - terrorised prehistoric Earth during the dying days of the dinosaurs more than 70 million years ago.

At 16in long, it was twice the size of the largest frogs alive today and one of the largest ever discovered.

Professor Susan Evans, of University College London, who identified it, said: "This frog is a relative of today's horned toads.

"If it shared their aggressive temperament, it would have been a formidable predator on small animals. It might even have eaten hatchling or juvenile dinosaurs."

The discovery of the frog, reported Tuesday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, is forcing fossil experts to think again about how the continents used to be connected.

Madagascar split from Africa around 160 million years ago but remained connected to India, South America, Antarctica and Australia.

It was thought that Madagascar and India broke away from the other continents around 120 million years ago, while Madagascar went its own way around 88 million years ago.

However, the giant frog finding suggests that a land bridge between Madagascar and South America remained until late into the dinosaur age.