The cache is NOT at the posted coordinates!
…the island of Atlas. Hidden deep under the surface is a legend that waits for an age of explorers who are brave and clever enough to venture into the lost city. There, a secret is concealed, a secret that could potentially change the course of the Earth as we know it. Recently, archaeologists along with the help of researchers and scientists have uncovered a way describing the steps to reach Atlantis. Take on this journey to find the mysterious power, but beware for a power, so great, it could be used to improve or destroy our world forever…
The Oceanic Research Conservation Academics Association (O.R.C.A.A.) has been surveying and exploring the oceans for over 100 years. Discovering a new species or two every week in the depths of the ocean has become a common occurrence. Recently though, some scuba divers have found fragments of what seems to be the remains of an ancient civilization. Atlantis. O.R.C.A.A uses high-tech radar to pick up the pieces of clues that have traces of Atlantis within them and they post their findings for explorers who are up to the challenge to investigate. An Explorer’s Log is at every fragmented clue to keep record and track of every adventurer who has made the trek. Make sure you sign it with your name and the date of the find!
Shark teeth are a common fossil that allows scientists and researchers to know more about these ancient and modern day creatures. Due to the cartilage makeup of sharks, it would be difficult to know about sharks without their teeth which have been fossilized over thousands of years. Shark teeth are modified placoid scales and similar to human teeth consisting of a central pulp cavity surrounded by a hard enamel surface and dentine. Typical fossilization takes 10,000 years and the teeth that are usually found today are 65,000 years old from the Cenozoic era. Shark teeth are fossilized when they sink to the bottom of the sea or ocean and are covered and buried quickly by sediment. The sediment protects the teeth from outside factors such as weathering, abrasion, and scavenging and it limits the exposure to oxygen and bacteria which would further decay the tooth. Fossilizing the teeth takes thousands of years and is called permineralization. The teeth are able to have different colors from blue/grey, black, orange/red, white, or green depending on what minerals are deposited by water into the open pores of the tooth with silica and calcite being the most common minerals. Fossilized shark teeth are found in sedimentary rocks which have been formed over thousands or millions of years from the compression of sands, mud, silts, and clay.
The teeth of a shark are one of its most useful tools in eating it's prey. Instead of chewing their food, they instead use the teeth for cutting their prey into mouth sized pieces to easily eat and fit in their mouth. Replacing teeth for a shark is similar to a conveyor belt system. The teeth are arranged in rows and the teeth in the front row do the majority of the work and when one falls out, a tooth from the previous row replaces it. This is possible since the teeth are not attached to the jaw, but to the skin that covers the jaw.
A shark can have over 30,000 teeth throughout their lifetime and since the teeth are not attached to the gums by roots like human teeth, shark teeth easily fall out by being stuck on prey or being pushed out from other teeth. Younger sharks replace their teeth faster due to the need for a stronger jaw and sharks slow their teeth replacement in the winter when they don't eat as much.
The teeth are shaped differently for each species of shark due to their different diets. The four main type of teeth are needle-like, plate-like, triangular, and non-functional. Fish-eating sharks have long and narrow needle-like teeth due to their diet of fish and their unique teeth help them catch the slippery and streamlined fish.
Sharks that have the triangular teeth use the sharp and serrated edges of the tooth to tear apart the flesh of their prey (such as seals, sea lions, smaller whales, fish, or even other sharks).
The sharks that have the plate-like teeth and the tiny teeth are part of the "Fish are friends, not food" group due to their diet not consisting of fish. Some sharks eat at the benthic zone (lowest level of the ocean or sea) and have thick and dense plate-like teeth which are used for crushing the shells of their prey which consists of bivalves and crustaceans (crabs and clams).
The biggest sharks (and some of the biggest creatures) of the ocean are the least harmful due to their diet of eating krill and plankton. Their teeth are very tiny and mainly useless since they are fed by filtering water through their gills and by using gill rakers to separate the food from the water.
The key to solving the cache is by matching the sharks to their teeth...
The sharks are waiting for their next meal...find the cache or become shark bait. Ooh ha ha!
Congratulations to jeffgamer! He was the FTF for this clue of Atlantis!