Mike Bowers was shelling along the sand at Sea Isle City when he spotted something unusual poking up from the beach and called his son Bo over to take a look. What the pair pulled from the ground was a fossilized tooth belonging to a Megalodon, the long-extinct predatory shark that once ruled the ancient seas.
Mike Bowers, who is from Monongahela in Washington County, was vacationing in New Jersey with his family when he discovered the tooth, according to WTAE. Bo Bowers said he felt really excited after pulling the tooth free, and the station reports he intends to hold on to it. His father described the discovery as a bucket list find for both him and his son.
The family says the find was later confirmed as a genuine Megalodon tooth by the Cape May Whale Watch & Research Center, an organization that runs research cruises and tracks local marine life, including dolphins and great white sharks, off the southern New Jersey coast.
A Vanishingly Rare Beach Discovery
True Megalodon teeth are exceptionally rare finds along New Jersey’s shoreline. Dr. Dana Ehret, curator of natural history at the New Jersey State Museum and a fossil shark specialist, notes that fewer than 10 confirmed beach-found specimens exist in state museum collections, according to the NJ Conservation Foundation. Smaller fossilized shark teeth, often from ancient sand tigers or makos, turn up far more commonly in New Jersey’s streams and beaches, but a complete Megalodon specimen surfacing on the shore is a genuine rarity…