Whales are making the headlines these past few weeks. Pro- and anti- whaling countries are embroiled in a tug of war after no compromise was reached in the recent meeting of the International Whaling Commission. Meanwhile, a sperm whale carcass was found near my city -in Samal Island, Davao del Norte- alarming fishermen in the area because of the possible health hazard that the decomposing body of the marine mammal could pose. But the biggest whale news of all is the discovery in Peru of a Jurassic predator three times the size of modern killer whales.
The teeth of Leviathan melvillei (that's the name of the pre-historic whale, in honor of Moby Dick writer Herman Melville) were so large it was initially assumed they were elephant tusks.
"The fossilized remains found in Peru include a jaw bone and several teeth, each around 12 centimeters in diameter and up to 36 centimeters in length."
"The size of its teeth indicate that the mammal fed on large prey, possibly baleen whales which were plentiful at the time of the Leviathan's existence around 12 to 13 million years ago, in the middle of the Miocene Age."
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