The Giant Megamouth Shark or Megachasma pelagios is an extremely rare deep sea shark! This species was only discovered in 1976 in Hawaii, and since then there have only been a handful of sightings! It is the lone member of the family Megachasmidae, and has been reported only in the deep, cold waters of the Indian, Pacfic and Atlantic Oceans. 
Much like the Whale Shark and the Basking Shark, the Megamouth Shark simply swims around with its mouth open, which is full with over 50 rows of very small, hooked teeth. It collects food by filtering out the water with its gills, what's left after the water is drained out is its dinner. Like a lot of other deep sea creatures, they actually have photophores that give off light and attract the plankton and small shrimp right into their mouths! You can check out the Giant Megamouth Shark underwater in this rare footage...This next video shows a variety of shark species and then an indepth look at the 6th Megamouth Shark ever captured at the 2 minute mark in the video below.
Giant Megamouth Sharks are brownish black in coloration and can reach impressive lengths of 6 meters (20 feet) and weigh in at 1500kg (3300lbs)! They are not considered to be very fast swimmers, but this doesn't really matter because they don't have very many nature predators due to their large size. Like other sharks, the Giant Megamouth Shark gives live birth.
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