Top Dog

[theropod]

There haven't been any rigorous estimates for it either, and larger animals don't automatically become faster.

Some large marine animals can be very fast, but the fastest marine species are still more similar, perhaps slightly larger but not in a completely different order of magnitude, to the fastest terrestrial ones.

[Grey]

So far currently, what you guys think might be the best, more solid candidate ?
I exclude the oversize sperm whale given their unreliability hinted by blaze and richard

The 18m Carcharocles still stands ?

[Infinity Blade]

I have a question that might be (in a way) relevant here and has been bugging me for a bit.

Do you guys think that a macrophagous cetacean (akin to say, an orca or Livyatan) would be as good at hunting a much larger prey item single-handedly as a similar-sized shark (akin to say, a great white or C. megalodon)?

[Deathadder]

I think the shark would fare better due to its better adapted to macropredator lifestyle.

[richard]

How could the MAXIMUM size of Megalodon be only 18m when those vertebrae found in the Peruvian desert in 2006 added up to 18.26m? Now this individual in life would obviously be longer still, is the scientific world taking a huge step back in terms of understanding this creature?!
megalodon.e-monsite.com/pages/c-megalodon/la-decouverte-du-siecle.html I'm sure most of you know about this already, but here's the link anyway

[Grey]

Jun 6, 2015 12:20:01 GMT 5 richard said:

How could the MAXIMUM size of Megalodon be only 18m when those vertebrae found in the Peruvian desert in 2006 added up to 18.26m? Now this individual in life would obviously be longer still, is the scientific world taking a huge step back in terms of understanding this creature?!
megalodon.e-monsite.com/pages/c-megalodon/la-decouverte-du-siecle.html I'm sure most of you know about this already, but here's the link anyway

Hi Richard, to note, the information was provided to the admin by me (I'm French). Some of the info is perhaps incorrect, the actual status of this specimen is problematic and the details about it are sometimes conflicting with each other. So everything from it should be taken very cautiously but I've heard that Hönninger is giving a public talk about it this summer.

Anyway size estimates from isolated or even associated vertebra are hardly solid until we get more solid data.

Using Gottfried's, if the largest vertebra in the column was about 26cm, it would correspond to a 16m individual...

[creature386]

Jun 6, 2015 12:20:01 GMT 5 richard said:

How could the MAXIMUM size of Megalodon be only 18m when those vertebrae found in the Peruvian desert in 2006 added up to 18.26m? Now this individual in life would obviously be longer still, is the scientific world taking a huge step back in terms of understanding this creature?!
megalodon.e-monsite.com/pages/c-megalodon/la-decouverte-du-siecle.html I'm sure most of you know about this already, but here's the link anyway

18 m is probably rounded anyway, so a 18,26 m specimen does not necessarily contradict that statement. That being said, I am not faithless regarding Megalodons that are like 19 m or so long.

[theropod]

Jun 6, 2015 6:46:39 GMT 5 Infinity Blade said:

I have a question that might be (in a way) relevant here and has been bugging me for a bit.

Do you guys think that a macrophagous cetacean (akin to say, an orca or Livyatan) would be as good at hunting a much larger prey item single-handedly as a similar-sized shark (akin to say, a great white or C. megalodon)?

Probably not.

It goes without saying that the prey usually hunted by both would be broadly comparable in terms of size (simply because these size classes of whales were the most common), and long orcas strangely seem quite capable of taking similar-sized prey to great whites in relation to their body size.

Based on the morphology of their biting apparata however, it’s clear that the killing styles of C. carcharias and C. megalodon is more well-suited for attacking prey of larger body sizes.
Their tooth types compare somewhat similarly to the way carnosaur and tyrannosaurine teeth compare. Their jaws and some other aspects are obviously different in many features, but the overall adaption of the lamniforms and carnosaurs being to deal very long-deep slashing wounds for a maximum effect of soft-tissue damage and exsanguination and the tyrannosaurines and odontocetes to deliver blunt, bone-crushing force and to grip, puncture and shear remains similar. The analogy can likely be extended to relative prey sizes, except that in larger animals the the prey size will generally be somewhat lower proportionately, because the absolute size of the largest and most common prey animals remains similar.

I think that matches up nicely with the fact that orcas often kill large prey by ramming or drowing (though the former attests to the potency of their ramming, the latter rather shows their advanced social hunting strategies), not biting.

[Grey]

Even though meg teeth can be compared to the carnosaurs, they're usually described as particularly robust, less prone to be broken.

As for the thread, well most of the time I think that C. megalodon is the most powerful macropredator ever (as it is the one with the largest size estimates in the modern litterature), sometimes I think it is rather L. melvillei (because of the uncertainties surrounding it and its skull is the most powerful preserved skull that we have from a carnivore) and very rarely I tend to envision that the MoA case could be indicating a colossal pliosaur.

[theropod]

Who exactly described C. megalodon teeth as "less prone to be broken" than carnosaur teeth?

[Grey]

Of course there is no recorded direct comparison between meg and carnosaurs teeth (actually Jim Farlow compared meg teeth with T. rex teeth).

But meg teeth have been several times described as being extremely robust and unlikely to crack while puncturing a bone. The exact opposite statement I've heard for some carnosaurs, although I think I've read that some carnosaurs had relatively thicker and more robusts teeth than in others.

[theropod]

Sept 6, 2015 8:46:57 GMT 5 Grey said:

Of course there is no recorded direct comparison between meg and carnosaurs teeth (actually Jim Farlow compared meg teeth with T. rex teeth).

But meg teeth have been several times described as being extremely robust and unlikely to crack while puncturing a bone. The exact opposite statement I've heard for some carnosaurs, although I think I've read that some carnosaurs had relatively thicker and more robusts teeth than in others.

Citation needed. Also there's no basis for objective comparison there, statements about meg are naturally relative to C. carcharias, while theropods always get compared to T.rex, whose teeth aren't just somewhat robustly constructed but ridiculously incrassate, contributing to very poor cutting performance.

[Grey]

Meg teeth are compared to C. carcharias but the statement of them being very robust is not comparison based.

[theropod]

"Very robust" is always comparison-based. Very robust compared to what? To the great white? Compared to T. rex? Compared to a placodont?

That’s not a quantitative assessment of their strength.

[Grey]

No, comparison is not necessary, you can tell if one tooth has a robust structure without template. In his unpublished chapter, Kent describes them as such without comparison with white shark. I've looked at very numerous meg teeth and these things are as robust as an axe blade,,whatever you compare them to a white shark tooth or not. The only superior mechanical advantage of T. rex teeth are their longer root.