Why Shark Teeth?

So many shark teeth!

How do we find so many shark teeth on Little Gasparilla Island's beach?  It's only two miles long, but some folks stay only a few days and leave with over a thousand!  (Recent Facebook posts prompted me to write this piece.  You can see the pictures on the public group "WeLoveLGI").  

Are there really that many sharks hanging out in southwest Florida, spitting out their teeth?  Well, technically I've found only one fresh white shark tooth in ten years, but I have found thousands of FOSSILIZED shark teeth.  Island "old-timers" have been doing the same thing for decades.  But the island has never had a reported shark attack and NatGeo has never come to Little Gasparilla to film for Shark Week.  

So how did they get here?  Why Little Gasparilla?  Well, geologists tell us that in past ages much of Florida was a shallow inland sea --- a perfect habitat not only for sharks but also for all sorts of other aquatic and semi-aquatic creatures that were good shark food.  The teeth and bones of these creatures often 'survived' in fossilized form.  Sharks, even today, don't have bones but they sure do have lots of teeth---four rows of them.   And, as crazy as it sounds, they can lose a hundred or more teeth in a single feeding frenzy, then just grow new ones!  

Anyway, the ancient rivers that eventually drained the inland sea carried with them tons and tons of fossilized creature-bits (particularly the smaller, lighter ones).  Those fossils wound up being deposited in the riverbeds and around the mouths of the now-long-gone rivers, a couple of which were near present-day Little Gasparilla Island.  Consequently the waves and currents of the present-day Gulf of Mexico are constantly exposing the fossils and washing them onto Little Gasparilla's beach.  And because Little Gasparilla has no bridge connecting it to the mainland, there are relatively few people pickIng them up. 

It helps that the minerals in Florida's ancient environment colored almost all of those fossils black.  The sand of LGI's beach, on the other hand, is white and fine-grained, like sugar, so the fossils are quite noticeable by their color.  They are also noticeable by their shape.  For example, shark teeth, even though most are small or worn, have a rather familiar shape---flat, smooth, and pointed or lobed.  Stingray teeth are simple oblongs.  Bones tend to be relatively "chunky," which makes finding them easy.  Identifying them is tougher.  You'll probably need to do some research to figure out what animal they came from.  

The biggest problem encountered on LGI when looking for shark teeth is those darn seashells that tend to pile up on the beach!  Piles of shells are great if you're a shell collector.  But finding fossilized shark teeth in a pile of shells can be tough.  Admittedly, seashells on the beach are typically either fresh and highly colored, or sun-bleached and fading toward white.  However, older seashells and corals can be blackened by time, just like the fossils. That means you'll often pick up a bit of shell that you thought was a shark tooth until you get really good at spotting the difference.  

So practice makes perfect!  Slap on the sunscreen, get out there, and start looking. 

Thank you for being a part of the journey.