Description

Megachasma applegatei
Early Miocene (Saucesian)
Jewett Sand
Pyramid Hill, Kern County, California, USA

Approximately 10mm shark tooth. Chipped root, but crazy rare.

Lamniformes, Megachasmidae.

Megachasma is the genus for megamouth sharks.  It dates back to at least the Late Oligocene and still lives today.  It’s known from a few sites in North America, Chile, and Europe.

These teeth had been known to science since at least the early 1960’s but were finally officially described in 2014.  Back in the 60’s, no one knew what they were, thinking they were perhaps some kind of sand tiger shark.  When the modern megamouth shark was discovered in 1976 and its dentition was studied, it became apparent that the Early Miocene teeth belonged to a close relative.

The species is named in honor of the late Shelton Applegate, a paleoichthyologist at the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History during the 1960’s and 1970’s.