The leatherback turtle is the biggest turtle in the world. These wonderful creatures start out small and then grow into giant 1,000 monsters of the deep. On the outside they just look like your regular, everyday giant turtle. But when they open their mouths it’s a whole different story.
Here’s a full grown leatherback turtle, swimming majestically through the sea.
“Now say ahhh.” This what the inside of the leatherback turtle’s mouth looks like. Yeah I’m scared too.
Inside they have hundreds of sharp, jagged, stalactites. The stalactites line the inside of the turtle’s mouth all the way down to its stomach.
These horrifying things make sure that the turtle’s prey (mainly jellyfish) are digested as quickly as possible.
This is because jellyfish aren’t particularly nutritious and the leatherback turtle needs to eat almost its entire bodyweight in jellyfish, everyday.
This way the leatherback turtle gets the nutrition it needs as quickly as it can without expending extra energy.
Just for fun, here’s what a baby leatherback turtle looks like.
They’re so cute! It’s crazy to think that they’ll eventually grow in to giant, 1,000 pound sea creatures.
A man hanging with a leatherback turtle for scale.
No don’t touch it! You don’t wanna know what’s hiding in its mouth.
(Via: Lost At E Minor)
They’re almost kind of cute, in a horror story sort of way. At least they only eat jellyfish, those things are downright evil.
