Sorry Pete, yes Venice is know as the Shark Tooth Capital of the World by recognition as a title, probably because of its popularity, abundance of teeth, and ease of diving.
The World Record Megalodon Tooth was actually found here by Randy Owens, a local diver, and later sold by Vito Bertucci who was considered one of the foremost experts on Megalodon Teeth (before his death two years ago). His shop was here in Beaufort (Port Royal) and he was a good friend of one of the guys I dive with regularly.
Now, there is always some debate to this (ARTICLE BELOW). Randy's tooth was the largest UNRESTORED full tooth. There have been other teeth, that would have probably been larger, but they were chipped or incomplete and were RESTORED to the estimated length.
I have seen several teeth that would probably be bigger than the 7.1+ inches of Randy's tooth, but they were broken as well.
I can tell you this, from just below Savannah, GA, up to around Charleston, SC, the number of teeth found is incredible. We just have black water and hundreds if not thousands of miles of waterways, which makes it more of a challenge and most novice divers do not like to braille dive for sharks teeth under 35' of water in a river with current moving 3+ knots.
RGecy
First for the megalodon tooth - while there is no governing body of shark tooth collecting this meg is widely recognized by dealers and high-end collectors as the LARGEST UNRESTORED LENGTH MEGALODON TOOTH EVER FOUND. This is an opinion that we will also acknowledge and fully back in writing. We have seen plenty of huge 7 inch and up teeth that were more putty than tooth. If you want to use this definition as a reliable basis then do not read further because you can spend the same amount of money on something mostly man-made but technically larger. This meg is exactly 7.102 inches long x 5.07 inches wide with absolutely no restoration to the tip, root corner, or anything in-between that would add to the length. Is this the world record by much - no. There have been a couple other natural 7 inch teeth found in the past 3 years that are 100 percent natural and almost as large but this still holds the record.
History of the tooth - it was found by diver Randy Owens in a South Carolina river probably close to 15 years ago. When found the tooth was complete but had some enamel peel (missing enamel in the center) on both sides. Tooth was then sold to the late Vito Bertucci who commissioned extremely professional restoration work to repair the missing enamel (again, only enamel has been restored). While at a fossil show the tooth was accidentally dinged against the table and the very tip serration either almost came off or was nicked off. Either way it has been stabilized with a bit of fossil glue (we're talking about something the size of a pinhead here) and it does NOT add to the overall length of the tooth. If anything it makes it just a hair shorter than it was originally but it is almost impossible to notice. Vito held onto the tooth for about a decade before selling it to a private collector at a major fossil show several years ago. We acted as an unpaid broker in the deal. The tooth has since been held in that world-class private collection where it still resides to this day.
This interests me a little, cause it seems to be legal with no lease needed.
