Palaeontology

Huge prehistoric shark found in cave wall

By T.K. Randall
February 1, 2020

Image: AI-generated (Midjourney) Given that sharks continuously lose and replace their teeth throughout their lives, shark teeth are among the most commonly discovered prehistoric fossils in the world.

The rest of a shark's body, by contrast, is a very rare find because cartilage breaks down easily and hardly ever survives fossilization, making such discoveries few and far between.

When ecologist Rick Olson and paleontologist Rick Toomey stumbled upon a large, fossilized shark head in Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky back in November therefore, it quickly became apparent that they had discovered something very significant indeed.According to palaeontoloist John-Paul Hodnett, the species - Saivodus striatus - dates back around 330 million years to the Late Mississippian period and was around the size of a great white shark.

"Most significantly, the majority of the shark fossils we discovered come from a layer of rock that extends from Missouri to Virginia, but never documented the presence of sharks, until now," said Hodnett. "It's like finding a missing puzzle piece to a very big picture."

The same cave is also thought to be home to the fossil remains of up to 100 other sharks.

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Shark fossils of Mammoth Cave National Park

A post shared by John-Paul Hodnett (@desertsabertooth) on Nov 6, 2019 at 6:12am PST

Source: CNET.com

Tags: Shark, Fossil