Hi, welcome to Enchiridion. I am honored to share with you these facts on Megalodon!
Link to the great Julian Johnson-Mortimer who made the animation.
@johnsonmortimer
Make sure to check out the rest of his work, he has some great stuff!
Megalodon was a species of shark that lived roughly 23 to 3.6 million years ago, during the Early Miocene to the Zanclean of the Pliocene.
While regarded as one of the largest and most powerful predators to have ever lived, Megalodon is only known from fragmentary remains, and its appearance and maximum size are uncertain.
Scientists differ on whether it would have more closely resembled a stockier version of the Great White Shark, the Whale Shark, also known as Rhincodon typus, the Basking Shark, or Cetorhinus maximus, or the Sand Tiger Shark, Carcharias taurus.
Most estimates of Megalodon’s size extrapolate from teeth, with maximum length estimates up to 47 to 67 feet, or 14.2 to 20.3 meters and average length estimates of 34 feet, or 10.5 meters.
Estimates suggest their large jaws could exert a bite force of up to 108,500 to 182,200 newtons, or 24,400 to 41,000 pounds of force. Their teeth were thick and robust, built for grabbing prey and breaking bone.
Megalodon probably had a major impact on the structure of marine communities.
The fossil record indicates that it had a cosmopolitan distribution, meaning it dwelled worldwide.
Megalodon belongs to the Kingdom Animalia, the Phylum Chordata, the Class Chondrichthyes, the Superorder Selachimorpha, the Order Lamniformes, the Family Otodontidae, the Genus Otodus, and the Type Species Otodus megalodon.
It probably targeted large prey, like seals, whales, and sea turtles.
Juveniles inhabited warm coastal waters and fed on fish and small whales.
Unlike the Great White, which attacks prey from the soft underside, Megalodon probably used its strong jaws to break through the chest cavity and puncture the heart and lungs of its prey.
The animal faced competition from whale-eating cetaceans, such as Livyatan and other macroraptorial sperm whales and possibly smaller ancestral killer whales.
As the shark preferred warmer waters, it is thought that oceanic cooling associated with the onset of the ice ages, coupled with the lowering of sea levels and resulting loss of suitable nursery areas, may have also contributed to its decline.
A reduction in the diversity of baleen whales and a shift in their distribution toward polar regions may have reduced Megalodon's primary food source.
The shark's extinction coincides with a trend of gigantism in baleen whales.
Audio Design:
"Jurassic Forest", "Canyon of Terror", “End Credits”, “Tyrannosaurus”, “Survival of the Cynodonts”, “The Ankylosaurus”, “Spirits of the Ice Forest” - Walking With Dinosaurs Soundtrack by Benjamin Bartlett
“George Street Shuffle”, “Impact Lento”, “Isolated”, “Lost Frontier”, “Lost Time”, “Majestic Hills”, “Past The Edge”, “Ascending The Vale”, “Love Song”, “Anguish”, “Phantasm”, “Ultralounge” - Kevin Macleod
Clarifications & Notes:
(1) Now that we know about Megalodon’s size and weight, how powerful was its bite?
(2) Its extinction along with those of several other marine megafaunal species…
(3) Most estimates of Megalodon’s size extrapolate from teeth, with maximum length estimates up to 47 to 67 feet, or 14.2 to 20.3 meters.
#Enchiridion #PrehistoricBeasts #Megalodon #Paleontology
#Shark #Sharks #OtodusMegalodon #Otodus #GreatWhiteShark #Carcharodon #Carcharocles #Oceans #Ocean #Prehistoric
Table of Contents:
0:00 - Introductory Story
2:28 - Introduction
5:45 - Naming
8:16 - Biology; Appearance
10:19 - Biology; Internal Anatomy
13:21 - Biology; Size
20:59 - Biology; Weight
22:56 - Biology; Teeth and Bite Force
28:47 - Paleobiology; Growth and Reproduction
31:41 - Paleobiology; Range and Habitat
34:43 - Taxonomy; Scientific Classification & Evolution
42:49 - Paleobiology; Feeding Strategies
46:15 - Paleobiology; Prey Relationships
48:37 - Paleobiology; Competition
51:53 - Extinction; Climate Change
54:50 - Extinction; Changing Ecosystem
59:12 - Popular Culture
1:03:24 - Conclusion
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Transcript:
www.deviantart.com/madwizard3...
Sources:
Collareta, A., Lambert, O., Landini, W., Celma, C., Malinverno, E., Varas-Malca, R., . . . Bianucci, G. (2017, January 04). Did the Giant extinct shark CARCHAROCLES megalodon target small Prey? Bite marks on marine mammal remains from the late Miocene of Peru. Retrieved April 28, 2021, from www.sciencedirect.com/science...
Cooper, J., Pimiento, C., Ferrón, H., & Benton, M. (2020, September 03). Body dimensions of the extinct giant shark Otodus megalodon : A 2D RECONSTRUCTION. Retrieved April 28, 2021, from www.nature.com/articles/s4159...
@johnsonmortimer
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Негізгі бет MEGALODON vs LIVYATAN
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