North Sea Warmth Links Fossil Sharks to White Return
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- North Sea recorded an average surface temperature of 11.6 °C last year, the warmest since measurements began in 1969.
- Olivier Lambert of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences and his colleagues examined whale fossils from North Sea sediments dated to about 5 million years ago.
- Fossilized tooth fragments embedded in the whale skulls revealed that sharks fed on the ancient whales.
- Acta Palaeontologica Polonica published the study, noting one tooth belonged to a bluntnose sixgill shark and another to the extinct mako shark cosmopolitodus hastalis, a relative of modern great whites.
- North Sea today is too shallow for modern whales, yet rising numbers of dolphins and seals are being attracted to its warming waters.
- Lambert and his colleagues postulate that the increasing presence of dolphins and seals could attract great white sharks and other large marine predators back to UK waters.
Why it matters: The fossil evidence hints at ecosystem change as climate warms the North Sea, potentially reintroducing apex predators such as great white sharks and altering the balance of marine species, which would affect UK coastal ecosystems and related industries and tourism.
