Fisherman catches head of shark bitten off by mystery predator

'We didn't see what ate it but it must have been impressive,' said Trapman Bermagui

A fisherman caught a “monster” shark – only to discover it had already been half-eaten by an even bigger predator.

The angler, who calls himself Trapman Bermagui, hooked the shortfin mako in the South Pacific Ocean off the coast of New South Wales, Australia.

But by the time he had hauled it on to his boat he was left with only the severed head with one fin attached. The head alone weighed about 100kg, he claimed.

“So this was all we got back of this monster mako,” he wrote on Facebook. “Unfortunately we didn’t see what ate it but must of been impressive!!”

“It was a crazy morning of shark fishing. Hoping to catch smaller sharks but just hooked big sharks that got eaten by bigger sharks again.”

He also claimed that when his crew cut into the mako head they discovered the spear-like bill of a marlin embedded inside from a previous battle.

The post sparked dozens of suggestions about what might have eaten the mako, including Orcas, a great white or even a Megalodon, an extinct species of shark that existed millions of years ago.

One joked that the culprit could be a penguin or possibly a colony of penguins, adding: “What they lack in flight ability they make up for with ferocity. Me personally wouldn’t ever turn my back on a bird fish.”

Several people replied with the classic line from the movie Jaws: “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

Others were not so impressed, claiming that the fisherman had exaggerated the size of the shark head by using a false perspective for the photograph.

The mako is considered the fastest shark in the world, reaching speeds of up to 43mph, and ranges in size from 2m (6.5ft) to 4m (13ft).

Though they are potentially dangerous to humans, only around 10 unprovoked attacks have been recorded, according to the Florida Museum website. By comparison great whites have been implicated in more than 300 attacks on humans.