Shark Spotter A digital companion to Ocean and Sea
Sharks are the kings of the ocean. Discover more about these amazing creatures and the watery world they live in.
What is a shark?
Introducing sharks and their extraordinary skills as predators
How sharks are vital to our oceans; how you can help save them
Order Lamniformes: Fierce but misunderstood predators
Order Squaliformes: The world’s most common sharks
Order Pristiophoriformes: Sharks with serrated swords
Order Squatiniformes: Flattened sharks who ambush prey
Order Carcharhiniformes: Sharks from the largest order
Order Hexanchiformes: The most primitive sharks
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Whale shark The whale shark has the distinction of being the world’s largest fish. A typical 40-foot-long specimen weighs in at an astounding 45,000 pounds! Despite its threatening name, the whale shark is not dangerous to humans. It feeds on plankton and other small organisms.
This beautiful creature is found mainly in the tropics, where its gentle nature, large size and attractive spotted pattern makes it a favorite attraction for scuba divers. The whale shark is related to other carpet sharks, so-called for their beautiful patterns. tail fin
Most sharks swim by moving the tail fin from side to side to drive the body forward.
Dorsal fin Rigid dorsal fin helps keep the shark afloat.
Unlike bony fish, shark have no gill covers and the gill slits open directly to the outside.
Skin The dotted pattern on each
whale shark’s skin is unique – just like your fingerprint.
Gills
Jaw Whale sharks’ huge jaws are not used for biting, but for filter feeding.
Latin family name Rhincodontidae
Diet Filter feeder on algae, plankton, krill, squid
Reproduction Gives birth to live young
Behavior Gentle giant
WhAle shARk
pectoral fin Paired side fins are used for steering and help lift the shark in the water.
Whale shark[the big one][ ] Click buttons and colored words for sample content
Whale shark Whale shark, the largest of all sharks and the largest of all fishes. The biggest specimen measured was nearly 45 feet (15.2 meters) in length. The whale shark is the only large shark covered with white spots and the only shark with the mouth at the end of the snout rather than below it.
Whale sharks are open-sea fishes found in tropical waters around the world. They sometimes range as far north as New York and as far south as southern Brazil and Australia. They are especially abundant in the Philippines, the Red Sea, the Caribbean region, and the Gulf of California.
The huge mouth measures 5 feet (1.5 meters) across in medium-size individuals. The numerous tiny teeth are not used to catch food. Instead, the whale shark uses its gill rakers to strain plankton, small fishes, and squid from the water. The rakers are attached to the bottom of the gill bars and extend forward into the throat, where they form an interlocking net somewhat like the baleen (whalebone) plankton strainer in whales. When water is strained through the rakers, food animals are trapped and swallowed.
Sometimes whale sharks feed while cruising slowly along the surface. At other times they take up a vertical, tail-down position and bob up and down in the water, gulping their prey on each upward bob.
Whale sharks are of no economic importance because their liver lacks the concentration of vitamin A that has made some sharks valuable catches.
Latin family name Rhincodontidae
Diet Filter feeder on algae, plankton, krill, squid
Reproduction Gives birth to live young
Behavior Gentle giant
WhAle shARk
plankton Plankton is made up of many kinds of organisms, most of them so small they can only be seen with a microscope. All of these organisms are very different from one another. But in one respect they are all alike--they share a drifting way of life. In fact, the term “plankton” comes from a Greek word for “wandering” or “drifting.” Scientists generally separate plankton into two groups: phytoplankton and zooplankton. Phytoplankton includes single-celled plants and plantlike organisms, such as algae. Zooplankton includes minute protozoans and sea animals.
Directly or indirectly, every living thing owes its existence to plankton. More than a billion years ago, plankton first started putting oxygen into the atmosphere, making life possible for land plants and animals. All living things in the oceans depend on plankton for food as well as oxygen. The flow of food energy begins with phytoplankton, which are eaten by zooplankton, which are eaten by small fish, which are in turn eaten by larger fish, and so on. If we change the waters of the world, we risk destroying the plankton. This is dangerous because the health of our waters, and of our planet, depends on plankton.
diatoms, the smallest kind of plankton
one gallon (3.7 litres) of seawater contains up to
Fish Fish are water animals (aquatic) that are usually born from eggs and breathe through gills. They are vertebrates, that is, animals with a backbone and an internal skeleton. It is hard to determine exactly how many different species, or kinds, of fish there are. We know of more than 21,000 different species of fish today. This means that there are more species of fish than all the other vertebrate species combined. New species of fish are constantly being discovered as the deep sea and other remote waters are explored, leading scientists to speculate that the actual number may be closer to 28,000 species.
Fish are usually divided into three major groups: the primitive jawless fishes, including lampreys and hagfishes; and two groups of jawed fishes—the cartilaginous fishes, including sharks, skates, and rays, and the bony fishes, which are by far the largest group and include most of the familiar fishes such as trout, perch, bass, cod, halibut, and tropical fishes raised in home aquaria. Despite their name, shellfish, of course, are not fish at all; these invertebrate animals are either crustaceans (such as shrimp, lobsters) or mollusks (such as clams, oysters).
that’s the incredible length of time that fish have been on earth!
Skin The dotted pattern on each
whale shark’s skin is unique – just like your fingerprint.
gill noun
Like other fish, sharks do not breathe air but get oxygen from the water through their gills. Each gill opening contains a system of many tiny blood vessels called capillaries. As the shark pumps water into its mouth and out through its gills, oxygen from the water is absorbed and carbon dioxide is eliminated by the capillaries.
[patterned] The whale shark is the largest of 30 species of sharks known as carpet sharks. They all have patterned and mottled skin that looks like a carpet design! Carpet sharks are often large, but rarely dangerous to humans. some bear live young, others lay eggs. Many species are bottom feeders, primarily eating molluscs and crustaceans. Most have barbels - whiskerlike organs that house taste buds and are used to search for food.
Carpet sharks Nurse shark
Reproduction Gives birth to live young
Behavior Nocturnal, lives with 40 individuals
Amazing fact likes to eat sea snakes
NuRse shARk
Diet Fish
Amazing fact ‘Wobbegong’ means ‘shaggy beard’ in Australian aboriginal language
WOBBeGONG
Distribution New Guinea to Australia
Diet Crustaceans, worms, small bony fishes
Reproduction lays eggs, up to 50 a year
Behavior Nocturnal, found on coral reefs or tidal pools
Amazing fact ‘Walks’ by wriggling body and pushing with fins
ePAuleTTe shARk