Instantly separable from the other gray requiem sharks by one feature: the first dorsal fin is enormous, triangular, and set far forward, standing higher relative to the body than in any other shark of its size. The animal itself is stocky and brown-gray, usually about 2 m (6.5 ft) and recorded to 3 m (10 ft), with a short rounded snout and a ridge between the dorsal fins.
It is a bottom shark of soft ground rather than reef, working sand, mud and the mouths of bays for rays, small sharks and fish, mostly at depth and mostly at night. Adults segregate by sex for much of the year and travel in loose same-sex groups.
What this species is really known for is its nurseries. Females return to shallow, sheltered, low-salinity bays to give birth, and the pups stay in that same nursery for years before moving out, which concentrates an entire generation into a handful of small, fragile places. Damage to one bay costs a whole cohort, and this is one of the clearest cases in fisheries science of a shark whose fate is tied to specific coordinates rather than to the open sea.
Thick-skinned, fin-heavy and slow to mature, it has been a primary target of the fin trade. Listed as Endangered.
How to recognise it
first dorsal fin very tall and triangular, set far forward
Caught with trawls, surface and bottom longlines, gillnets, drift nets and tuna traps (“Tonnara”) in the Mediterranean Sea (Tudela et al. 2005, Bradaï et al. 2006, Echiwikhi et al. 2013, 2014). It is primarily threatened by bottom trawl fisheries and other artisanal and commercial fisheries throughout the Mediterranean Sea and Eastern Central Atlantic.
Sandbar Shark is the most important shark species captured in the Gulf of Gabès (Bradaï et al. 2006). In this area, juveniles are caught with longlines and trawls and adult (and often gravid) females are targeted using specially-designed gillnets (locally known as “kallabia” from “kalb bhar”) during spring and early summer, when they move inshore to give birth (Saidi et al. 2005, Bradaï et al. 2006, Echwikhi et al. 2013).
This is a long-lived species with low fecundity and is very vulnerable to overfishing (Springer 1960, Casey et al. 1985, Sminkey and Musick 1995, 1996; McAuley et al. 2005); it has been severely overfished in the Mediterranean Sea. Habitat degradation of this species’ coastal nursery areas through coastal development and pollution also pose an important threat.
Threat classification from the IUCN Red List.
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