[Alandriel (OP)]

See those biters?


aren't you glad they're extinct and not wandering down your road?


fish have them

...my special friend the tiger shark




even birds

 [] oops.....


lets hope evolution does not learn to do the photoshop thing []  []



Question is: Who in the kingdom of animalia has the most teeth ?

Me wants to know

[Karen W.]

COOL PICTURES!
http://www.earthlife.net/mammals/teeth.html

"Looking the other way to see who has the most teeth we have to visit two of the 3 orders that gave us the mammals with the least teeth. On land the mammal with the most teeth is the Giant Armadillo Priodontes giganteus order Edentata, which can as many 100 teeth in its jaws. In the oceans the real master of teeth comes from the order Odontoceti. The Long-snouted Spinner Dolphin can have as many as 252 teeth in its long thin jaws. These teeth are more like reptile teeth in that they are all the same basic shape, thin sharp little spears. This makes them good for catching and holding the slippery little fishes that dolphins live on."

[Carolyn]

Gawddd Alandriel!  Did know I'm terrified of birds?  At first glance that picture mortified me! []

[SquarishTriangle]

The radula is a ribbon-like feeding organ (like a tongue) of many molluscs, and can carry from only a few up to 100,000 or more chitonous teeth that are organised in rows (varies with species). These rows are continually replaced as the teeth wear out from feeding.

Dangerous, however? Well...probably not unless you're algae, or you don't like being scraped. The radula is used to 'rake up' food particles from the substrate and draw them into the mouth.

[Karen W.]

Thats a lot of teeth! LOL!

[neilep]

You do NOT want to mess about with these monstrosities that were the result of some Saber Tooth Tiger DNA accidentally falling into a vat of plastic in a Comb factory !!

 [ Invalid Attachment ]

[Alandriel (OP)]

Apologies Carolyn - did not mean to spook you - sorry!  [:I]


Neil: it's a good thing that DNA did not land on my toothbrush  []



SquarishTriangle is of course right  [] - thanks for that!
Who would have thought? I certainly never would have suspected snails to hold the record.




Scanning electron microscope (SEM) image of snail teeth (Natural History Museum UK)




a modern snail displays its radula Nature dot com

[neilep]

AWESOME PICTURES ALANDRIEL.

Squarish Triangle...excellent post !!

[SquarishTriangle]

Ta Neil.

[JimBob]

The radula is a ribbon-like feeding organ (like a tongue) of many molluscs, and can carry from only a few up to 100,000 or more chitonous teeth that are organised in rows (varies with species). These rows are continually replaced as the teeth wear out from feeding.

Dangerous, however? Well...probably not unless you're algae, or you don't like being scraped. The radula is used to 'rake up' food particles from the substrate and draw them into the mouth.

Gee, you must be a biologist  - first ontogony recapitulates Philogony, Now raudla - I know about radulas or radulii, too.

Bona-fi-des ? - http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=2178.msg34659#msg34659

 - even those on predatory snails, the whelk, for example, which drill into the shells of oysters, pectins other bivalves and other gastropods and barnacles.

NOW, Δ², why do things in the (old) order Edentata (Latin for "without dentition") are named this when they have teeth ?

--------------

On more consideration, perhaps paleontology student?

[Karen W.]

Those are crazy teeth there!

[SquarishTriangle]

Hum...interesting. Can't say my knowledge on armadillos is that extensive, but I shall attempt to speculate.

It seems all members of 'Edentata' lack incisors at the front, maybe to help them accomodate a long tongue(?). Maybe when they were named, it was incorrectly assumed they had no teeth since there aren't any at the front.

I probably wouldn't bother too much with teeth either if I were an armadillo eating little insects. 100 teeth is still fairly significant. Perhaps just a vestigial trait, like humans having tails. Perhaps they need to extract every last bit of goodness out of the bug juice.

It also seems that Edentata was abandonned as an order after being found to be polyphyletic (multiple families incorrectly grouped together; not representative of evolutionary history...) Science can of course be wrong.

http://digimorph.org/specimens/Zaedyus_pichiy/whole/
http://digimorph.org/specimens/Phocoena_phocoena/adult/

Biologist...yeah I suppose. As it probably says in my bio, my background is in marine biology and zoology... and currently studying to be a veterinarian. I did have a brief stint toying with paleontogy but I prefer to work with live animals. Bit of a mongrel really.