The prehistoric giant predatory shark megalodon was certainly a terrifying critter. My question is – would one of these mega-sharks be capable of killing the biggest specimens of the blue whale, the most massive mammal ever recorded?
Let’s say that the whale has detected the approach of the shark as it attacks.
The behemoth has just a bit of time to react to the onslaught of nasty sharp pointy teeth. Will it be able to fend off the attack? Or is the whale doomed?
Yeah, I knew that they would go after whales. I wondered if the very biggest blue whales would be too much for them. Do orcas hunt the big adults, or just try for babies and juveniles?
I think they could, whether or not they did, I’ll leave to the experts. I saw some footage in a whale documentary that showed a pod of orcas attackinga big blue. They chomped off it until they had their fill, then left, leaving it mortally wounded.
The big problem with hypothetical animal vs animal fights is that, most of the time, they’d just ignore or avoid each other.
Look up “bug fights” on youtube. Even in a tiny container, the critters from different habitats don’t recognize each other as prey or danger, and spend most of the time trying to escape. The fights between animals from the same habitat are over much more quickly.
Unlike orcas, Megalodons were probably solitary hunters. The related Great White Shark will scavenge whale carcasses, they rarely if ever attack live whales much larger than themselves. (They will attack marine mammals their own size or somewhat larger.) They are mostly ambush hunters, with larger ones specializing on marine mammals.
Megalodon probably would have attacked and eaten smaller whales like Minkes. Its unlikely they would have attacked an adult Blue Whale. Even if it did it probably would not be able to kill the whale outright, although it might bleed to death from bites.
Another problem with these animal death-match questions is that hunters are always more cautious than they need to be. Even if you can attack a full-size, healthy, aware blue whale head-on, why in the heck would you? There are plenty of smaller, sicker, unaware victims who are far less likely to hurt you back. A predator can’t afford to be injured; even a 10% chance of being hurt means you’re dead in less than a year.
Sharks are a perfect example of this. They are attracted by blood, and by odd vibrations in the water that suggest an injured fish. Even then, they’ll circle the target and attack from below or behind whenever possible.
So, while I don’t doubt that the megalodon could have killed the blue whale, it would have to be one desperate shark with no other options to even try. They’re just not interested in a fair fight.
I wonder if the megalodon spurred the evolution of a monster-size cetacean like the blue whale. The bigger you get, the less likely that you will seem like an easy meal…
Gonna be ignernt here I think, but what exactly can a blue whale do to protect itself? Megalodon got up to about 70 feet long, blue whales about 100. In general, bigger = less agile. As hunters of large-ish prey, sharks are pretty nimble and the largest ones–the basking & whale, are filter feeders. The big whales, likewise, hunt masses of tiny little things that can’t get out of the way–no need for being particularly nimble, just gape your maw and swim through the ball of food.
Megaladon vs. a blue whale seems more like a contest between a panther and a sloth. What am I missing about the whale?
Megalodon at 70 feet is a bit of a stretch. We only know it from its teeth and all size estimates are essentially educated guesses based on the relationship of tooth size to body size in modern sharks.
If it was Blue Planet, they were attacking a juvenile blue whale while its mother tried to protect it. I seriously doubt even a Tillicum-sized orca has the jaw articulation to bite the trunk of an adult blue whale’s body. Their jaws only open about 45-50 degrees. Google brings up a couple of references to attacks on adult sperm whales, though I imagine those were females. Nothing fucks with male sperm whales.
gytalf and RNATB are both correct: blue whales have very powerful tail muscles and can deliver quite a slap, as well as being large enough to be an extremely difficult item for any predator to actually handle. While bites might hurt, a deadly bite would be very difficult for any predator, even the largest of extinct predators, to deliver.
Ramming - a tactic often used by orcas and sharks to stun prey - is definitely not advised against an adult blue whale that might outmass a large orca by as much as ten times or more.
Blue whales are also extremely fast, clocked at over 25 knots for short speed runs.
In general for all the large baleen whales, predators focus only on the young and already sick/injured animals. Attacking a healthy adult blue, humpback, or grey whale is just not worth it. Calves/juveniles are the object of virtually all attacks.
I’m not sure what footage Earl saw, but I would bet the blue whale was large, but not an adult.
My understanding (and I am far from being any kind of expert on marine biology) is that, when orcas attack whales, they rarely try to eat the whole thing- they tend to attack baleen whales, and their target is one thing only: the whale’s big, meaty tongue. A pack of orcas will attack a baleen whale repeatedly, just to get into its mouth and start tearing out its tongue.
Once the tongue is gone, the orcas will swim off, leaving the mortally wounded, tongueless whale to drift off and die. The rest of the whale’s body is of no interest to the orcas, who leave the carcass for assorted sea scavengers.
I think that even without hitting a Megalodon with it’s tail a big blue could cause massive turbulence that would throw off the shark’s attack. If the whale were at rest it might be somewhat vulnerable to an attack from below on the front half of the whale, but if the whale were already in motion it could probably outswim the shark easily. But as others have mentioned, it seems unlikely that shark would attack a whale more than twice it’s size. The behavior of more intelligent orcas probably doesn’t apply to sharks, so unless a shark has the intelligence or instinct to attack the vulnerable parts of the whale it probably doesn’t have a chance, even if it can open it’s jaw wide enough to cause more than a flesh wound.
2 possible scenarios:
Realistic: the megalodon ignores the whale and goes off to find easier prey
Mind-controlled shark: it bleeds the whale to death by biting its fins and flukes off
As I understand predation, it is usually outliers (sick, elderly, weak) who are taken. Those in their prime stand a better chance at surviving, while the young are protected by adaptive measures.