Six full-body fossils of Ptychodus sharks have been formally analysed for the first time, revealing that they were fast swimmers that preyed on shelled creatures
that thrived during the Cretaceous period appear to solve a long-standing mystery around how it hunted and where it fits into the shark evolutionary tree.This left researchers unsure about the shark’s overall appearance and feeding habits, although the broad, flat shape of the teeth suggests they were suited to crushing hard-shelled prey.fossils in Mexico.
This is intriguing because, regardless of their diet, lamniform sharks tend to be highly active predators that hunt in open water, unlike any shell-crushing, or durophagous, organism alive today.is that it is so far the only known open-water, fast-swimming shark with a durophagous diet,” says Vullo. “This suggests that ptychodontids preyed on well-armoured pelagic organisms, such as large ammonites and sea turtles.
While the individuals they studied are small, at under 3 metres, the researchers estimate from tooth size that some members of the genus reached around 9.7 metres in length. This is roughly double the length of great whites – the females tend to be larger and generally measureat Birkbeck, University of London, yet we knew next to nothing about them until now. “It’s almost the last jigsaw piece in putting together Cretaceous ecosystems,” he says.
Fish Palaeontology Fossils Sharks
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