Leopard shark. Photo and video

This species is endemic, that is, it has a limited habitat, namely the part of the ocean adjacent to the South African coast.

The leopard shark is a bottom dweller. It is found at a depth of 20-30 meters. The shark prefers rocky reefs with a lot of vegetation or a sandy bottom with dense algae. In these places, the leopard shark hides during the daytime, and goes hunting at night.

Appearance of a leopard shark

Although these sharks have a formidable name, in terms of aggressiveness and size they are in many ways inferior to other members of the family.

The maximum body length of a shark is approximately 80 centimeters, and individuals weigh a little more than 3 kilograms. The females are smaller than the males.

The muzzle of the leopard shark is flattened, slightly pointed. The large mouth contains many sharp teeth. On the body there are 2 dorsal fins, shifted closer to the tail. The pectoral fins are quite wide. The skin of the shark is protected from above by placoid scales, the same as in others.

The color of the back ranges from light to dark, while the belly is almost white. There is a distinct border of color change. The back is decorated with bizarre patterns of large and small dark spots. Sometimes the spots merge with each other, resulting in stripes. The pattern changes with age.

Also, the color may vary, depending on the habitat, that is, some groups have one color, and the shade of other sharks is noticeably different.

Behavior and nutrition of a leopard predator

Leopard sharks live in packs. These small predators hunt small fish and invertebrates. These sharks spend their entire lives at the bottom of the ocean. They often get entangled in fishermen's nets and die.

In case of a threat, leopard sharks hide in burrows or in algae, and if there is no shelter nearby, they curl up into a ring and cover their muzzle with their tail.

Reproduction and lifespan

Leopard sharks lay eggs. The eggs are in a small thin film bag, the bag has small tendrils along the edges, with which it attaches to algae, that is, the shark does not lay them on the seabed. There are 2 eggs in the container.

After 5 months, small sharks hatch from the eggs, they break the film and get out to freedom. The body length of newborns is only 10-11 centimeters.

When the body length in males reaches 45-65 centimeters, they have puberty, and in females this period begins when they grow to 40-60 centimeters.

The life span of a leopard shark is 15 years. But aquarium sharks survive to this age, but the life expectancy of wild individuals is not known.

Leopard shark and man

For humans, leopard sharks are completely harmless. These predators have edible meat, but for some reason it is not customary to eat it. These bottom fish are hunted only for the purpose of catching for life in an aquarium. Due to their unusual coloration, leopard sharks look very impressive in large aquariums.

The population size is not known. But since leopard sharks are often caught in nets, it can be assumed that there are quite a lot of them, and the threat of extinction of the population does not threaten.

The leopard shark, also known as the California three-toothed shark or the spotted sharp-toothed mustelid shark, belongs to the mustelid shark family, which is quite possible, since the mustelid family includes 7 genera and about 30 species. The Latin name is Triakis semifasciata.

The leopard shark has a characteristic head shape: while the muzzle of the fish itself is narrow, the mouth is quite wide and opens well - this is achieved due to the elongated and strongly curved mouth line, as if cutting through most animal head.

Such a feature of the location of the oral fissure allows a powerful stream during hunting, which sometimes helps to bring the moment of contact with the prey closer.

This also causes inconvenience, since with the current of water the leopard shark sucks everything in it, including sea worms, brown algae, and also silt from the bottom.

The mouth of the fish is toothy, in fact the entire oral bend is covered. The upper teeth are visible even when the mouth is closed.

In the mouth there are 10-15 dentitions in the upper and lower jaws. Each tooth is equipped with a narrow central point and two small lateral teeth. Unlike females, males have slightly curved central teeth.

Like all sharks, there is a process of restoring lost teeth during life. And the leopard shark loses its teeth quite often, which is not surprising, because the main diet is hard-shell crabs, shrimp, clams and, if you're lucky, small fish.

Photo of leopard shark teeth

Photo of the jaws of a leopard shark

Watch video - Leopard shark:

What is special about the leopard shark?

In contrast to the narrow snout, the body of the shark is quite dense, which, however, does not interfere with its maneuverability. Maximum weight- up to 20 kg. The greatest length of the shark is up to 2.5 meters, on average, the body length is 0.9–1.5 meters.

Due to nutritional high speed she does not need to move, but big eyes, which have a nictitating membrane, are essential for food tracking. Also on the head are clearly distinguished, under triangular growths.

Of course, the color of the shark is impressive, for which it is nicknamed the leopard - on a silver-gray or bronze-gray background, dark and light spots to match the color. Dark large horseshoe-shaped spots are located on the dorsal part along the ridge.

Closer to the belly, the color spots lighten and decrease in size; spots fade with age. The belly, like all sharks, is at least a tone lighter, sometimes whitish.

Does the leopard shark attack humans?

It is the beauty of coloring, kindly character and small size that attract divers from all over the world to admire and take pictures against its background.

This is not always successful: the leopard shark - a spotted beauty - is rather shy and quickly moves away from the intruder. The location of the fins helps them in this - wide triangular pectoral fins, two rounded dorsal fins and a long tail.

In this regard, leopard sharks are considered not dangerous to humans.

However, in 1995, a leopard shark was reported to become aggressive and chase a diver who had a nosebleed underwater. Fortunately, the episode ended happily.

Watch the video "Diving with Leopard Sharks":

Habitat and breeding of the sea leopard

The distribution area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe beauty is not very large - East End Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of California. The main temperature of the habitat is 10-12 degrees - this is the water temperature in shallow water, on average at a depth of 4-4.5 meters.

Especially this species sharks love quiet backwaters and bays, rocks and reefs - an ample habitat for finding and eating mollusks and crustaceans.

These fish are mostly "sedentary". Having chosen a feeding place, sharks, as a rule, take root there. And only a strong drop in water temperature in winter time forces leopard sharks (especially representatives living in the northern part of the range) to move south.

Leopard sharks live long enough. So, sexual maturity is reached at the age of 10 years, and in an aquarium, in captivity, they can live up to 20 years. These are ovoviviparous fish that go to shallow water in order to create offspring.

Watch video - Leopard shark in the aquarium:

The leopard shark, due to its unpretentiousness, is quite often caught to be placed in an aquarium for the amusement of a person.

In this case, the small size of the shark, the absence, the inability to develop high speed played a cruel joke - a person not only disturbs representatives of the species for the sake of interest and entertainment, but also eats (as described in, they have tender, easily digestible meat).

Thus, the leopard shark belongs to commercial fish, the catch of which is estimated in tens and hundreds of tons.

If we take into account that they reach sexual maturity after 10 years of age, then it is quite possible that with uncontrolled capture, most representatives of the species will soon remain only in photographs.

The spotted bearded shark belongs to the family of carpet or baleen sharks (Orectolobidae), which includes several dozen species. One of them is the bearded shark. She is easily recognizable by the beard that surrounds her head. These outgrowths give the shark a very funny look.

Bearded sharks can be found in the western Pacific. In particular, our heroine lives off the coast of Northern Australia, New Guinea and Eastern Indonesia. And its close "relative" - ​​the Japanese bearded shark - in the southeastern part Sea of ​​Japan, in the South China and East China Seas, as well as in the Yellow Sea. She swims at shallow depths, among coral reefs.

The shark has an average size - about 1-1.5 meters. Although some specimens can reach 3-4 meters, this happens very rarely. And does it happen at all?

Its flattened body has a grayish or yellowish-brown color with light large spots. This allows the shark to easily camouflage among the sandy bottom and corals.

She has rather wide pectoral fins and a head, which is decorated with a no less wide mouth with small teeth in several peaks. Its head is decorated with leathery fleshy outgrowths - "antennae" or "beard", with the help of which the shark easily "combs" the sand in search of small bottom fish.

Unique beard

In addition to fish, bearded sharks are not averse to eating invertebrates that live on the bottom.

Only one thing is known about their reproduction - they are ovoviviparous.

For a person, it does not pose a danger, the main thing is not to anger them. But if you dissolve your hands, drag it by the tail and poke it with a stick, then a painful bite is guaranteed.

But more recently, a family of baleen sharks presented researchers with sea ​​world surprise. Two new species have been discovered. The first was named - Orectolobus floridus, and the second - Orectolobus parvimaculatus, which reached a small size - only 70 centimeters. By the way, it is very similar to the spotted bearded shark, so at first the researchers mistook it for a young individual of this species.

The shark has a moderately thick body, the muzzle is narrow. Nasal openings stand out on the head, located under the triangular outgrowths characteristic of the shark. The eyes are large and have a nictitating membrane. The mouth has a strongly curved line. The structure of the mouth allows the fish to open its mouth wide. When hunting, the leopard shark uses not only its teeth, but also the ability to quickly draw water into its mouth. The mouth has up to 100 teeth growing at an angle to hold prey. The dorsal fin is large and well developed. It is located close to the head, between the pectoral and anal fins.

Sharks grow on average up to 1.5 m, although there were specimens exceeding 2 meters in height. The weight of the heaviest fish caught was 18.4 kg.

Leopard sharks live in the coastal zone at water temperatures above 10-12 degrees. In winter, when the temperature drops, sharks migrate south, passing up to 140 km. south to wintering grounds. However, such movements are seen only in populations living in the north of the American continent. Basically, leopard sharks are sedentary fish, remaining in their territory long time. Some individuals stop choosing their home in places of release warm waters from local power plants.

The depths do not attract sharks. They keep near the surf, in an area with a depth of up to 4 m. Favorite places habitats - muddy or sandy closed bays, rocky reefs and thickets of brown algae, although it can also live on the open coast.

The diet consists of crabs, small fish, shrimp, shellfish and bottom worms. To catch a prey, the shark draws water into its mouth along with its prey. At the same time, she puts her jaws forward, the teeth on which she holds her prey in her mouth. Like other sharks, leopard sharks change teeth to replace lost ones during their life. Fish can lose teeth due to an attack on mollusks in hard shelters, or on the hard shell of crabs. At the same time, completely untouched sea worms were found in the bodies of many caught fish, which suggests that prey was “sucked out” from the seabed.

Leopard sharks are very cautious and quickly run when a potential enemy approaches, so they do not pose any harm to humans. Only documented the only case a scuba diver's shark attack that occurred in 1955. Because of this attack, the leopard shark now bears the proud title of " potentially dangerous". A person, on the contrary, conducts a real predatory activity in relation to this fish. Leopard shark meat is delicious. Until 1980, uncontrolled fishing was carried out. Currently, no more than 45 thousand individuals per year are allowed to be caught.

Appearance, as well as unpretentiousness in maintenance, made the leopard shark a welcome guest in any aquarium. Now these fish are kept not only in public aquariums, but also in private aquarists. In captivity, the leopard shark can live up to 20 years.