FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 29 



where it is one of the rarer sharks, and at Nantucket. While only a stray in the 

 Gulf of Maine, it must visit the outer coasts of Nova Scotia in some numbers every 

 summer, for Harry Piers, of the Provincial Museum, Halifax, informs us that there 

 are three specimens in the museum — one of them 10 feet 5 inches long — taken near 

 Halifax. He also reports a fourth taken there in 1895, and writes that this shark 

 was ''plentiful at entrance to Halifax Harbor about 25 August, 1920; first seen 

 about 15 August; last seen 23 September." Cornish 21 also saw two specimens at 

 Canso, Nova Scotia, but whether the "blue dogs" described to him by local fisher- 

 men as common on the neighboring fishing banks actually are this shark seems 

 doubtfid. On the European side of the Atlantic the blue shark is not uncommon in 

 summer around the south coasts of Great Britain, and has been taken casually as 

 far north as southern Norway. 



Occurrence in the Gulf of Maine. — The claim of this species to mention here 

 rests on a single specimen from Massachusetts Bay recorded by Garman (1913), 

 but being comparatively so common off Nova Scotia it is to be expected in the Gulf 



Fig. 7.— Great blue shark {Galeus glauew) 



any summer. It may be noted in passing that it is viviparous, and that Nichols 

 and Murphy " have given a graphic account of it as it is met with by whalers on 

 the high seas. 



7. Dusky shark (CarcharMmts obscurus LeSueur) 



Shovelnose 



Jordan and Evermann, 1896-1900, p. 35. 

 Garman, 1913, p. 130. 



Description. — In the dusky shark (a moderately stout-bodied species) the 

 second dorsal is not over one-half as high as the first. The latter stands well back 

 of the pectorals, but, being nearer these than to the ventrals, is relatively further 

 forward than in the blue shark and further back than in the tiger shark. The rear 

 margin of the first dorsal is deeply concave; the pectorals are relatively long and 

 narrow (twice as long as broad) and reach back as far as the rear edge of the first 

 dorsal. The second dorsal is even smaller than the anal, over which it stands. 

 The tail is long, occupying more than one-fourth of the total length of the shark, 



" Further Contributions to Canadian Biology, 1902-1905 (1907), p. 81. In 39th Annual Report of the Department of Marine 

 and Fisheries, 1906, Fisheries Branch. Ottawa. 



i! Brooklyn Museum Science Bulletin, vol. 3, No. 1, 1916, p. 9. Brooklyn. 



