Under the skin of a predator

If you mis-spent your youth hanging around natural history museums, you've seen a good number of skulls. You've almost certainly seen the cast of a T. rex skull, and probably the skull of an Allosaurus as well; you may have seen the skull of my favourite dino, Stegosaurus, or the pointy Triceratops.  You'll know that Diplodocus had peggy teeth, and that hippos have scary ones. Sabretooth cats were, well, scarytooth cats, and Megalodon teeth are all the more impressive when the teeth of a great white shark are displayed next to them.

This, though, is the only skull so far that has made my partner exclaim “What the hell is that??” when he’s seen the photo on my monitor.  Just look at that jaw mechanism, the pointy head, the spiky bones at the base of the skull.  Do first impressions tell the whole story, though?  What is this, and where does it, or did it, fit into its ecosystem?

Gentlebeings, this is the skull of an active predator.  May I introduce you to Gadus morhua, more commonly known as… Cod.  Yes, cod, as in fish and chips.  Humble to us, but the bane of prey species including other bony fish, crabs, lobsters, squid, mussels and other molluscs, and worms.  Yes, I know, it's a modern species, not a fossil. It is just astonishing, though. 

I was really pleased with this photo, which I took in Leicester's New Walk Museum; pics taken through glass aren't always the best.  This one definitely deserves a place on this blog.