Behind Megalodon: The Giant Ancient Shark that Totally Vanished

If you think great white sharks are scary, you have to see what a Megalodon looked like. Check out these unbelievable facts about the all powerful Megalodon and be grateful this shark isn’t still around next time you take a dip in the ocean.

The biggest Megalodon tooth ever recorded was 6.9 inches. For reference, that is an entire 3 times larger than the average great white shark’s tooth. They were triangular and serrated, making them the perfect tools to tear into their prey.

These massive sharks could weigh as much as 143,000 pounds. For reference, Killer Whales only weigh about 7,000 pounds and those are absolutely huge beasts!

One scientist explained that a great white would measure to about the same size as a Megaladon’s reproductive parts. It would be only a fraction of the enormous beast! Great whites typically weigh between 4,000 and 5,000 pounds, so they would be completely dwarfed if they swam next to a Megalodon.

The mystery of the Megalodon is still unanswered to this day, although scientists and conspiracy theorists like to speculate as to what might have driven them to extinction. Some people even believe it could still exist to this day, hiding in the depths of the ocean. 

Also, the Megalodon continuously produced new sets of teeth throughout its life. Researchers believe the average Meg would produce between 20,000 and 40,000 teeth in one lifetime.

Researchers have found that the bite strength of the Megalodon was at least 3 times stronger than the bite strength of the T-Rex. We’d love to see a showdown between these enormous predators.

This prehistoric beast preyed on large marine mammals such as whales. They ate baleen and humpbacks mainly but would also settle for dolphins, seals, and other sharks. Any large sea mammal that they could get their fins on was lunch.

They would hunt the whales and eat their flippers and tails first to make escape impossible. No animal really stood a chance against these massive creatures. They basically ruled the ocean!

Since the Meg was at the top of the food chain, the only time it was really vulnerable to attack was when it was a newborn. When a Megalodon is first born it is about 7 feet long, which means larger hammerheads or other sharks could potentially attack if they were brave enough.

This was around the time that the Meg is predicted to have gone extinct, so some scientists believe the cooler temperatures were not habitable for the animal. Research has revealed that they preferred warm and shallow water.

About ⅓ of all large marine mammals became extinct when the water temperatures dropped. This caused changes along the entire food chain. So, if the Meg didn’t have enough food to eat, then they would not have survived.

Scientists agree that if the Meg were still alive today, we would know about it. Although we haven’t explored all of the vast ocean, we know enough that we would be aware of the giant sharks if they were still around.

As entertaining as the movie might be, scientists agree that it is not a possibility. If the Meg were still swimming around, we would come across animals with giant bite marks in them and their teeth would litter the ocean floors. While the movie isn’t accurate, it’s still a fun watch.

It would be like if you hadn’t eaten all day and you had the choice between one almond or an entire pizza. Which are you going to go for? Lucky for us, we are just the almond.

Contrary to other sharks who can go weeks and potentially months without eating, the Megalodon needed to eat regularly since they were such large animals. They fed on whales, large fish, and most likely other sharks.

Since they were partially warm-blooded, they were able to swim and hunt in colder waters that other sharks would not have been able to hunt in. This added to their ability to be at the top of the food chain for millions of years.

Researchers have drawn conclusions of the shark’s size from hundreds of fossil teeth, vertebral columns, and individual vertebrae. Even infants were enormous, starting at at least 6.6 feet in length. Scientists can only speculate the size in relation to the fossils they have found.

The head shapes were also similar in that they featured a bulky rounded snout and huge fins with a crescent-shaped tail. So think of the Megalodon as an incredibly large version of a great white shark. 

Likely, this was to allow the younger sharks to hunt easier prey and allow the parents to protect their young. The only time that the Megalodon was really vulnerable in its lifetime was when they were babies and brave hammerheads would come for a snack.

There is an old wives’ tale in Mexico that the shark attacks boats and kills fishermen. Blurry footage has captured a large presence underwater that some people claim as evidence of the shark’s existence. 

This means that they don’t have bones and so there aren’t bones to analyze. This explains the lack of “evidence” proving that the sharks are extinct. Scientists remind people that if they were still alive today, we would know about them. They’re too huge to hide and they lose their teeth so we would have found some by now.

The video racked up hundreds of thousands of views and the internet went wild with speculation. But many scientists have debunked the video, explaining that it is too easy to fake or edit footage these days. But people love to believe the impossible!

The Mariana Trench is the deepest part of the ocean, but the shark could not survive there because the temperatures are far too cold. Thus, to the great disappointment of shark lovers everywhere, the Meg is decidedly extinct. 

Then they would attack the flippers and fins of the prey, especially in the case of large animals. This would prevent them from swimming away and escaping. Their hundreds of teeth packed an impressive punch that few escaped from.

Dinosaurs lived between 245 and 66 million years ago whereas the Megalodon existed up until only 3 million years ago. The earliest Megalodon fossils are about 20 million years old, so dinosaurs and the Meg were pretty far apart in the timeline.

They actually thought that they were “tongue stones” or fossilized tongues of dragons and snakes. Some cultures even wore the teeth as pendants and they were thought to have medicinal properties.

Fossilized feces is known as coprolites and the shape of these objects actually gives scientists a lot of insight into the shape and size of their intestines. One coprolite was actually 5.5 inches in length.

You might also discover fossils from whales, turtles, and sea cows on your search. There are Megalodon traces here because it used to be submerged underwater and it was a host to many Megaolodn sharks. It’s been called “Sharktooth Hill” in recent years.

Pliny the Elder thought that the triangular teeth had fallen from the sky during lunar eclipses. He wrote about them in his many famous writings. It wasn’t until 1611 that the naturalist Fabio Colonna recognized that the objects were shark teeth.

They did thrive in warmer climates and coastal waters, but it seems they weren’t too picky about their territories. When you don’t have any natural predators, you basically get to pick and choose your favorite parts of the ocean!

Scientists have discovered some broken spines on animals and have surmised that the Meg might have rammed into their prey at full speed to stun them. They would take this opportunity to capture and eat their prey. No one taught them not to play with their food!

At the end of the Mesozoic period, there was a surge in plant life which then caused an abundance of large marine mammals. These were the Megalodon’s favorite food so they evolved to become much larger. There hasn’t been an abundance of food like this since then.

Similar to how the Megalodon ate other shark species, the giant whales ate other whales as well. We do not know if the two giants attacked one another but most likely they did fight over food.

This is because they were no longer competing with the Megalodon predator for food. There were still extremely high nutrient levels in the ocean so these whales grew to be what they are today: The largest animal on the planet today.