Fossil and Artifact Forum

There are certain types of damage that happen only to a tooth during feeding that cannot happen by falling off a cliff. The most common is a spall fracture. This happens when a shark bites into something hard like a bone and the tip of the tooth chips off. It usually takes a little strip of enamel with it, too, from which ever side took the brunt of the break. You'll usually notice wear around this kind of break, too, since the shark didn't always lose the tooth when it broke. We've all seen these types of breaks before, and I doubt that a fall or harsh encounter with a rock in the surf could produce this result. Think about it. Have you ever dropped a big tooth on concrete? What happened? It shattered because it was a rock. When the feeding damage occurred, the tooth was living tissue and had different properties that would cause it to fracture in a completely different manner. Another kind of feeding damage occurs when a shark would lose a tooth during feeding and would bite into it with another tooth. This type of damage is often identified by straight grooves in the tooth. Often, you can even see serration marks. Sometimes the teeth are bitten completely through. Look at the picture here and you can see a meg with this type of feeding damage:
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The picture on this page has the two types of feeding damage I've written about here. The top-left meg has a tip (spall) fracture, and the top-right was bitten right in two.