#otodus

[fossillad123]

world's largest shart

[mesozoicmarket]

A fossilized shark tooth of an Otodus megalodon from New Caledonia. Teeth from this locale are often very worn due to being dredged from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean off the coast of New Caledonia. However, this tooth does still retain remnants of serrations.

[knuppitalism-with-ue]

A piece from the #MonkeyCruise series, in which I take classic pieces from art history and replace humans with extinct primates and alter the scenes accordingly.

Here it's Mesopithecus witnessing a beached Otodus megalodon.

[randomanimaloftheday]

Day 415#: Otodus obliquus

Today's animal of the day is Otodus obliquus!

Image credit: SamDrawsMonsters

This large species of extinct shark is the oldest species within the genus Otodus and lived from the Early Paleocene to the Early Eocene, between 65 and 54 million years ago, and is believed to be the ancestor of the infamous giant shark, Megalodon! While not as big as its descendant, O. obliquus was still an absolutely massive shark, as were all the other species in this genus, with a maximum length estimate somewhere around 26 to 30 ft. Their fossils can be found throughout most of the world, implying that these gigantic apex predators were migratory and would likely travel long distances in search of turtles, large fish, and early marine mammals to eat.

Photo credit: Joanbanjo

Unfortunately, because shark skeletons are mostly made out of cartilage instead of bone, and cartilage doesn't fossilize well, the only fossil material we have of this species is its teeth and some vertebrae. As such, not much is known about their appearance, behavior, or even where they belong on the shark family tree. The genus Otodus was once considered to be related to and possibly even the ancestors of sharks in the family Lamnidae, which include modern great whites and salmon sharks. In fact, in 1923 there was even a debate about whether all the species within Otodus should be reclassified as Carcharodon, which is the great white's genus. However, the similarities between Otodus and Carcharodon that led earlier paleontologists to think the two were related are now believed to be due to convergent evolution. While Otodus' taxonomic placement remains a mystery, we actually now know a lot more about the true ancestors of the great white, such as Carcharodon hastalis and Carcharodon plicatilis.

[transparentfossil]

2.44" Juvenile Megalodon Tooth - South Carolina

[daily-mouse-fits]

Today's mice(and isopods) are introducing you to some of my other work! This is a little bit an ad, but hey, I should get to talk about some other stuff I do on occasion. And the other stuff I do is an Etsy store! I don't sell anything to do with the mice, and I don’t ever plan on doing it, but I do sell other things.

The isopods, of course, appeared in the April Fool's day picture, although they were wearing some of the mice's scarves at the time. Isopods, for those who don't know, are also called a lot of things, but most recognize them as pillbugs. Many species can not roll up into balls, but those that can are called pillbugs. Squishy and their friends are a little too round to roll up, but that's okay, we love them anyway. Squishy, Otodus, and Kitsune are the baby size of isopod, but there's larger sizes too. I just didn't want to try fitting them in the picture.

The other, smaller crochet creations plus the tassel are earrings! Or are meant to be, anyway. I have so many of them and I keep a lot of them in a bag, so putting earring hooks on all of them would be a Mess. I have a lot of little animals, fruit, and some other miscellaneous things like leaves, flowers, and, as is applicable since they showed up earlier... eggs! I started with the eggs, made way too many of them(I am not joking I have like 20-30 of them), and then branched out into other earring sized creations. They're meant to be cute, really mismatched, and lots of fun! I have my own set I wear around and switch out whenever I feel like it or there's a holiday coming up.

The final things in the picture aren't rocks, the two larger ones are shells, and the smallest one(which I also wear as an earring) is sea glass! I live near the coast, so I collected them. They are part of one of my other hobbies! Wire wrapping! I take cool rocks, beads, shells, or sea glass, and wrap wire around it and stick it on a necklace or earring hook. I have so many of these, honestly it's unholy.

Truly, my etsy shop is less of an attempt to make some money and more of an attempt to rid myself of the excess things I have because I love to Make these things, but then they build up and I have way too many!

[gaygottlieb]

megalodon isn't a relative of great whites at all if you even care btw. they were actually more like lemon sharks btw. btw if you even care

[katborg82]

Otodus megalodon, a massive lamniform shark from the early Miocene - early Pliocene with an estimated maximum length of 47-80 feet, hunts a lone Pacifichelys urbinai off the coast of Peru (~15-13 Mya)