Did the giant extinct shark Carcharocles megalodon target small prey? Bite marks on marine mammal remains from the late Miocene of Peru
Did the giant extinct shark Carcharocles megalodon target small prey? Bite marks on marine mammal remains from the late Miocene of Peru
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DOI：
10.1016/j.palaeo.2017.01.001
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发表时间：
2017-03-01
影响因子：
3
通讯作者：
Bianucci, Giovanni
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Collareta, Alberto;Lambert, Olivier;Bianucci, Giovanni
我们报道了从(秘鲁南部)Aguada de Loma暴露的皮斯科组上中新世沉积中收集到的切割哺乳动物骨骼化石的咬痕，并将其归因于巨型巨齿鲨Carcharocle megalodon。被咬的物质包括与小型须鲸有关的头骨残骸，以及鲸目动物和鳍足后颅骨的碎片。这是南半球首次出现这种情况，极大地扩大了仍然稀少的巨齿象咬痕记录；此外，在物种水平上首次发现了巨齿象的猎物(或食腐物品)(被称为Piscobalaena nana，已灭绝的神秘科Cettheriidae中的一个小成员)。由于所研究材料的碎片性质，无法确定检测到的标记的确切来源(即，通过拾取或主动捕食)。然而，根据实际观察和基于大小的考虑，我们提出，至少在今天的秘鲁海岸，矮小的神秘动物(例如，西特龙)是成体巨齿龙的一些目标猎物。因此，巨齿鲨在这里被解释为一种顶端捕食者，其营养光谱集中在相对较小的猎物上。最后，我们提出了最近各种小型神秘生物谱系的崩溃(观察到约3 Ma)与巨齿龙灭绝(发生在上新世末期)之间的联系。(C)2017爱思唯尔B.V.保留所有权利。
We report on bite marks incising fossil mammal bones collected from upper Miocene deposits of the Pisco Formation exposed at Aguada de Lomas (southern Peru) and attributed to the giant megatooth shark Carcharocles megalodon. The bitten material includes skull remains referred to small-sized baleen whales as well as fragmentary cetacean and pinniped postcrania. These occurrences, the first in their kind from the Southern Hemisphere, significantly expand the still scarce record of bite marks for C. megalodon; moreover, for the first time a prey (or scavenging item) of C megalodon is identified at the species level (as Piscobalaena nana, a diminutive member of the extinct mysticete family Cetotheriidae). Due to the fragmentary nature of the studied material, the exact origin of the detected marks (i.e., by scavenging or by active predation) cannot be ascertained. Nevertheless, relying on actualistic observations and size-based considerations, we propose that diminutive mysticetes (e.g., cetotheriids) were some of the target prey of adult C megalodon, at least along the coast of present-day Peru. C. megalodon is thus here interpreted as an apex predator whose trophic spectrum was focused on relatively small-sized prey. Lastly, we propose a link between the recent collapse of various lineages of diminutive mysticetes (observed around 3 Ma) and the extinction of C megalodon (occurring around the end of the Pliocene). (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.