Megamouth shark its food. A relatively poor swimmer, the megamouth has a soft, flabby body and lacks caudal keels. The megamouth is considerably less active than the other filter-feeding sharks, the basking shark and the whale shark. The megamouth has a stout body and a long, wide bulbous head. Megamouths are large sharks, able to grow to in length. Males mature by and females by . Weights of up to have been reported. As their name implies, megamouths have a large mouth with small teeth, and a broad, rounded snout, causing observers to occasionally mistake megamouth for a young orca. The protruding
Fish anatomy their chromatophores. The outer body of many fish is covered with scales, which are part of the fish's integumentary system. The scales originate from the mesoderm (skin), and may be similar in structure to teeth. Some species are covered instead by scutes. Others have no outer covering on the skin. Most fish are covered in a protective layer of slime (mucus). There are four principal types of fish scales. Another, less common, type of scale is the scute, which is: The lateral line is a sense organ used to detect movement and vibration in the surrounding water. For example, fish