Jaws agape, a 6-foot-long Hybodus pursues a swarm of squid-like belemnites
180 million years ago. One of the most common sharks during the "Age of Dinosaurs", Hybodus lived in the sea alongside
the ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs, but it had smaller relatives (some as little as 6 inches long) that lived in streams and
rivers.
To the lower left is Palaeospinax which belonged to the lineage that gave rise to all modern sharks and rays. Typically
less than 3 feet long, it was one of the first sharks to have solid vertebrae instead of a cartilaginous backbone found in
more primitive species of sharks with which it lived.
