page_title: Cretalamna
section_title: Habitat
hierarchical_section_title: Cretalamna / Paleoecology / Habitat
caption_attribution_description: A scale chart comparing Spinosaurus aegyptiacus with various contemporaneous taxa. S. aegyptiacus formed one of the main connections allowing nutrient flow between the terrestrial &amp; aquatic biomes. Apertotemporalis baharijensis Lepidotes sp. Bawitius bartheli Polycotylidae incertae sedis Mawsonia libyca Neoceratodus africanus Retodus tuberculatus Paranogmius doederleini Onchopristis numidus Spinosaurus aegyptiacus Schizorhiza stromeri Squalicorax baharijensis Cretolamna appendiculata Asteracanthus aegyptiacus
context_page_description: Cretalamna is a genus of extinct otodontid shark lived about 103 to 46 million years ago from the Late Cretaceous to Eocene epochs. It is considered by many to be the ancestor of the largest sharks to have ever lived, Carcharocles angustidens, and Carcharocles megalodon.
context_section_description: Fossil evidence of Cretalamna is found in deposits representing a diverse set of marine environments, indicating that it was able to adapt to a wide range of habitats. This may have attributed to its ability to exist through a long temporal range. The fusiform body of Cretalamna suggests it was a pelagic shark.
  The Cretaceous waters inhabited by Cretalamna were also home to a diverse range of cartilaginous fishes, bony fishes, turtles, squamates, plesiosaurs, pterosaurs, birds, and even some non-avian dinosaurs.
caption: Cretalamna (13, lower right) with contemporaneous aquatic animals
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