56 



FISHERY BULLETIN OF THE FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



A A 





Figure 22. — Dalatias (Dalatias licha), female, 58 inches long, from Georges Bank. A, upper teeth and B, lower teeth 

 from central part of mouth, about 1.5 times natural size. From Bigelow and Schroeder. Drawings by E. N. Fischer. 



shaped, curving somewhat outward toward the 

 corners of its mouth; but the lowers are erect, 

 broadly triangular, with serrate edges. 



Color. — Dark chocolate, cinnamon, or violet 

 brown below as well as above; the upper surface 

 sometimes with poorly defined blackish spots; the 

 dorsal and pectoral fins with pale or whitish edges, 

 the tail tipped with black. 



Size. — Most of those caught are between 40 

 and 60 inches long; 72 inches is the longest re- 



corded so far. The Gulf of Maine specimen illus- 

 trated in figure 22 was about 5 feet long and 

 weighed 23 K pounds, gutted. 



General range. — Eastern Atlantic, from tropical 

 West Africa to the Irish Atlantic slope; recorded 

 once from the American coast. 



Occurrence in the Gulf of Maine. — Our only rea- 

 son for mentioning this shark is that a female, 

 about 5 feet long, was taken on the northern edge 

 of Georges Bank on August 19, 1937 (fig. 22) .« 



THE BRAMBLE SHARKS. FAMILY ECHINORHINIDAE 



The only living representative of this family (it 

 is represented among the tertiary sharks) re- 

 sembles the Greenland shark and its allies in 

 lacking both anal fin and dorsal spines, but its 

 teeth are alike in the two jaws. 



Bramble shark Echinorhinus brucus 

 (Bonnaterre) 1788 



Spiny shark 



Bigelow and Schroeder, 1948, p. 527. 



Description. — The location of the first dorsal fin 

 above the pelvics instead of about midway between 

 the latter and the pectorals, and the very different 

 shape of its tail fin (cf. fig. 23 with fig. 21), are the 

 most conspicuous field marks separating this shark 

 from the Greenland shark. Brucus also differs 

 from the latter in that the teeth are alike in the 

 two jaws, instead of unlike, and that the skin of its 

 back and sides is sparsely strewn with large scales 

 with either one or two sharp points. 



" Recorded by Nichols and Firth, Proc. Biol. Biol. Soc. Wash., vol. 52. 

 1939, p. 85. 



O t> 





« a V.3 



m 



Figure 23. — Spiny shark (.Echinorhinus brucus), eastern Atlantic specimen about 3 feet long. From]Bigelow and Schroe- 

 der. Drawing by W. P. C. Tenison. 



