Scratch that – the orcas that snack on shark liversIt was an altogether different hierarchy millions of years ago when the fabled megalodon roamed the ocean, with new research suggesting the shark “could have devoured a creature the size of a killer whale in just five bites”., with fossil evidence used to create a 3D model of the megalodon:
At around 50ft from nose to tail, the megalodon was longer than a bus, according to the study in the journal Science Advances. That’s about two to three times the size of today’s great white shark. The megalodon’s gaping jaw allowed it to feed on other big creatures. Once it filled its massive stomach, it could roam the oceans for months at a time, the researchers suggest.
Co-author John Hutchinson called the megalodon a “superpredator” which dominated its ecosystem. That’s easy to believe when you consider that each of its teeth was the size of a human fist.Based on their digital creation, researchers calculated that the megalodon would have weighed around 70 tons, or as much as 10 elephants. The creatures lived an estimated 23 million to 2.6m years ago.
Apex predators are often uniquely vulnerable to environmental changes. The Pliocene epoch likely led to sea level changes and a decline in large prey, which forced the megalodon to compete with a number of smaller sharks for a dwindling supply of resources, accelerating its extinction.In South Africa, declining great white shark numbers in certain areas have led to the
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