Dunkleosteus, a placoderm, or armoured, fish. It lived around 370 million years ago, during the Devonian period and is arguably the biggest predator of its time. This was a truly impressive fish, literally hard as nails, its head was encased in a solid armour plating and like a shark, it had a streamlike body to swiftly move through the water. Its heavy armour means it would’ve been a relatively slow swimmer, yet capable of short spurts of speed, sort of like some sharks today.
This formidable beast had a major evolutionary strength, a moveable jaw. Fish began to dominate the oceans when they evolved the ability to move their jaw, yet Dunkleosteus had no teeth, what it had was much more menacing. It had razor like blades to slice its prey apart, like a pair of scissors to paper, with a bite more powerful than a great white. It would’ve been able to slice its prey in half so it was able to consume huge animals, yet on the downside the Dunkleosteus was unable to chew and on occasion its stomach found the huge chunks of meat hard to handle, evidence of this is in fossilised sick of the Dunkleosteus that has been found…
DUNKLEOSTEUS
Relatives of the dunkleosteus, other armoured fish, were mostly dog sized, but
Dunkleosteus was an exception. At 6 metres long on average, twice the length of human, this was a seriously big fish, yet it could reach up to 10 metres long, the length of a bus.
Dunkleosteus seems like the perfect predator. However, in its bony plates, indents of other animal teeth have been found suggesting that despite its strength, it was itself hunted. Dunkloesteus teeth marks have been found in its own fossils, they would eat whatever they could get their teeth into, including each other. The success of this gigantic beast was short lived, it was outcompeted by the more nimble sharks. Placoderm fish themselves would be extinct by the end of the devonian, taking the Dunkleosteus with it.
