It wouldn’t be the best way to go – being crushed by the terrifying club shaped teeth of a prehistoric sea monster <\/p>
The jaws of an ancient sea predator have been discovered in northeast Texas, adding to a very rare collection of bones from a species that ruled the oceans 80 million years ago<\/strong><\/p> Unearthed by a private fossil collector, the jaws of the Globidens\u00a0alabamaensis<\/em> \u2013 a 20ft long mososaur \u2013 were discovered in a thin, fossil<\/a>-rich deposit embedded in the North Sulphur River near Ladonia, Texas.<\/p> One of the jaw fragments holds 12 teeth, while the other holds six \u2013 each roughly an inch long. In one of the jaws, a germ tooth remains below the gumline. Scientists believe that, like sharks<\/a>, mosasaurs shed their teeth and replaced them throughout their lives.<\/p> What\u2019s unique about the teeth of this species of mosasaur is the bizarre shape. While mosasaurs like the Mosasaurus maximus<\/em> had sharp teeth designed for larger prey, G. alabamaensis had blunt, globular teeth, likely designed for crushing shelled animals, like turtles and ammonites.<\/p> Co-existing with the dinosaurs (but not dinosaurs<\/a> themselves) 80 million years ago, mosasaurs were among the ocean’s most fearsome and successful predators.<\/p> Mosasaurs had a long serpentine body, a powerful tail and paddle-like limbs. Its large head had powerful, flexible jaws.<\/p> Across the mosasaurs group the teeth differed and were specialised to their prey \u2013 as evidenced by the recently discovered jaws of the G. alabamaensis<\/em>.<\/p> Mosasaurs were highly adaptable and many different species evolved to dominate ocean habitats. However, alongside the dinosaurs, mosasaurs \u2013 including the mushroom-toothed G. alabamaensis<\/em> \u2013 were wiped out during the mass extinction event at the end of the Cretaceous period.<\/p> Main image: Reconstruction of Globidens alabamaensis Gilmore, 1912. Illustration by Nathan It wouldn’t be the best way to go – being crushed by the terrifying club shaped teeth of a prehistoric sea monster <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":42060,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"2"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/09\/a-fearsome-prehistoric-sea-monsters-jaw-complete-with-terrifying-club-shaped-teeth-designed-to-crush-turtles-has-been-found-in-texas.png",1248,928,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/09\/a-fearsome-prehistoric-sea-monsters-jaw-complete-with-terrifying-club-shaped-teeth-designed-to-crush-turtles-has-been-found-in-texas-150x150.png",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/09\/a-fearsome-prehistoric-sea-monsters-jaw-complete-with-terrifying-club-shaped-teeth-designed-to-crush-turtles-has-been-found-in-texas-300x223.png",300,223,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/09\/a-fearsome-prehistoric-sea-monsters-jaw-complete-with-terrifying-club-shaped-teeth-designed-to-crush-turtles-has-been-found-in-texas-768x571.png",768,571,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/09\/a-fearsome-prehistoric-sea-monsters-jaw-complete-with-terrifying-club-shaped-teeth-designed-to-crush-turtles-has-been-found-in-texas-1024x761.png",800,595,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/09\/a-fearsome-prehistoric-sea-monsters-jaw-complete-with-terrifying-club-shaped-teeth-designed-to-crush-turtles-has-been-found-in-texas.png",1248,928,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/09\/a-fearsome-prehistoric-sea-monsters-jaw-complete-with-terrifying-club-shaped-teeth-designed-to-crush-turtles-has-been-found-in-texas.png",1248,928,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"It wouldn't be the best way to go - being crushed by the terrifying club shaped teeth of a prehistoric sea monster","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/42059"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}What were mosasaurs?<\/h2>
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