A heavy brown carpet shark to 3.2 m (10 ft), with a broad flattened head, small eyes, a pair of short barbels at the nostrils and narrow sickle-shaped pectoral fins. By day it lies up in caves and under ledges, often in piles of a dozen or more animals stacked against each other, which is how most divers meet it.
It does not bite its food so much as inhale it. The throat works as a pump: the shark seals its small mouth against a hole and expands the pharynx, and the pressure drop pulls whatever is inside straight out. Octopus is the preferred prey, and an octopus wedged in a crevice is exactly the problem this mechanism solves. The suction is strong enough to be heard underwater.
Breeding runs on cannibalism of a sort. The eggs hatch inside the mother, and the embryos then feed on the stream of unfertilized eggs she keeps producing, growing large on that supply before birth. A litter is small in number and enormous in size, which is a strategy that works only if very few of the pups die - and one that recovers very slowly when they do.
The calm is real but conditional. This is a placid animal that tolerates close approach, and it is also a shark with a small mouth, a powerful pharynx and a habit of holding on. Bites happen almost exclusively when someone grabs a tail.
The genus. Nebrius Rüppell 1837 - nebrís (fawnskin). ETYFish
- broad flattened head with a short barbel at each nostril
- narrow sickle-shaped pectoral fins and pointed dorsal fins
- plain red-brown above, no spots or bars
- stacked in groups in caves and under ledges by day
Why it's threatened
Threat classification from the IUCN Red List.
