Otodus aksuaticus
Otodus aksuaticus is an extinct species of large shark in the family Otodontidae which may represent a transitional species between Otodus obliquus and Otodus auriculatus. They are similar in overall morphology to Otodus obliquus except they have serrations on their cusps and blade. It is sometimes placed in the genus Otodus. It is mainly found in the Ypresian stage of the Eocene epoch. They have been found in the Woodstock Member of the Nanjemoy Formation of Maryland and Virginia and Ypresian sediments in Aktulagay, Kazakhstan as well as the Ypres clay in Belgium and the London Clay in the United Kingdom.

WhodamanHD · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.
On record
Recorded, not inferred- Sits inside
- OtodusPBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Lamniformes
- Life habit
- nektonicPBDB, for Lamniformes
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Lamniformes
Time the record covers
At most 8 million years on record.
The one occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 56 Mya and 48.07 Mya, which is a dating window rather than a span.
1 occurrence of Otodus aksuaticus on record, most of them in the Eocene. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.
When
1 occurrences- Eocene100%
These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.
Found in
1 formation
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The named rock units Otodus aksuaticus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.
Otodus aksuaticus and its relatives
EoceneWhere Otodus aksuaticus and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.
Found in the same rock
14 taxa- Abdounia beaugei1 site
- Burnhamia1 site
- Eostegostoma angustum1 site
- Galeorhinus1 site
- Isurolamna inflata1 site
- Macrorhizodus nolfi1 site
- Myliobatis raouxi1 site
- Otodus auriculatus1 site
- Otodus obliquus1 site
- Pachygaleus lefevrei1 site
- Physogaleus secundus1 site
- Striatolamia macrota1 site
- Trigonotodus tusbairicus1 site
- Xiphodolamia ensis1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 1 site for Otodus aksuaticus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too.
This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.
Entered from
1 referenceEach of the 1 occurrence read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Each entry links to doi.org. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content1
Picture of Otodus aksuaticus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- WhodamanHD
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Otodus aksuaticus was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.
Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itOtodus through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Menner 1928)