Middle Miocene

Round Mountain Silt, Sharktooth Hill Bonebed

Ernst Ranch, Bakersfield, Kern County, CA, USA

7mm shark tooth.

Shark, Carcharhinidae.

Carcharhinus is a genus that includes a number of modern requiem sharks such as the bull, dusky, bronze whaler, whitetip, blacktip, and sandbar sharks.  It appeared around the Middle Eocene and greatly diversified during the Miocene.  It can very difficult to impossible to confidently identify teeth to species because there is overlap in morphology especially when you get to Miocene-Pleistocene forms.