ASU Research E-Magazine: The Better to Eat You With

Studded with 210 genuine fossil sharks’ teeth up to six inches long, the jaws are seven and a half feet wide and nearly seven feet tall. They belong to a creature that would gladly have dined on the great white shark made notorious by Hollywood movie makers.

For more than five months last year, fossil hunter John Babiarz worked with the curator of Arizona State University’s Museum of Geology to recreate the life-sized jaws of a 45-foot Carcharadon megalodon, a prehistoric relative of the modern great white shark.

Brad Archer and John Babiarz stand inside the giant jaws of a C. megalodon
Brad Archer and John Babiarz examine some of their dental work.

Babiarz, a fossil collector for more than two decades, is president of the non-profit Babiarz Institute of Paleontological Studies Inc. (BIOPSI). Working in collaboration with ASU’s Geology Museum, BIOPSI’s purpose is to promote paleontological education and research.

The jaws are among the most accurate shark jaw reproductions ever done, according to Geology Museum Curator Brad Archer.

Babiarz and Archer consulted shark expert Gordon Hubbell of Jaws International in Key Biscayne, Fla., to ensure that they had each tooth in the proper position.

They all look the same to the untrained eye, Archer says. “After working with Dr. Hubbell and helping put in all those teeth, I now can easily identify an upper from a lower tooth, or right from left side.”

Archer says that other museums have used tooth reproductions in similar shark-jaw exhibits. “Using all real teeth is kind of unusual. There aren’t too many like it around.”

Babiarz found some of the teeth used in the ASU exhibit while scuba diving in the alligator and crab-invested Cooper and Ashapoo rivers of South Carolina. He did have to buy most of the teeth. Depending on their condition, fossil sharks’ teeth sell for anywhere from $5 to $300 each.

“I noticed how hard it was to get some teeth and how easy it was to get others. I’d end up with 10 of one section and none of another,” Babiarz says. “I literally spent three years going through hundreds upon hundreds of teeth to get the right sizes, quality textures, and the right positions.”

The jaws are made of fiberglass and are a scaled-up version of the jaws from a modern 13-foot great white. Real sharks’ jaws are made of cartilage, like the rest of their skeletons, and are too soft to survive as fossils. The fossil teeth date from the Miocene and Pliocene epochs and are between 5 and 15 million years old.

Sharks continually shed teeth as they grow. They have up to six rows of teeth. As the worn front teeth fall out, they are quickly replaced by the next in line. Scientists estimate that a normal shark produces 30,000 teeth during its lifetime.

The continual shedding of teeth is why they are so plentiful in the clays of certain South Carolina rivers. Unfortunately, they occur in tidal areas, where the current is swift and the visibility poor. “You’re always swimming into the current,” Babiarz explains. “When you get tired or run low on air you can surface toward the boat and hope you don’t miss. If you do miss the safety rope, you’re going to be in for a big swim,” he laughs.

Babiarz says he usually feels the sharks’ teeth in his hands before he sees them. Visibility is less than a foot on a good day. While diving in the Ashapoo River last summer, Babiarz couldn’t read his diving gauge in front of his face.

“We had these special battery-pack lights that throw out a concentrated beam and still couldn’t see,” he says.

Alligators nested downstream from one diving area. They generally don’t bother divers, but Babiarz did get one scare. As he probed in the darkness for teeth, he felt something rubbery and hard. “First I though it was an alligator, but it turned out to be a clay bank, thank God.”

Crabs are a bigger problem.

“There were huge crabs all over the place. Crabs stand their ground. They won’t get out of your way,” Babiarz laments. A crab once grabbed one of his diving partners by the leg. “When they grab hold they don’t let go.”

Babiarz draws the line at diving for sharks’ teeth in South Carolina’s Morgan River. It’s just too deep and dangerous for his taste. The Morgan is so dark, some divers don’t even bother with a light. “They just grope around on the bottom, digging their hands in the mud feeling for sharks’ teeth. You don’t see anything until you bump into it. Anyone who dives there is truly dedicated.”—Steve Koppes