Fishes of the Western North Atlantic 103 



distance in male. Pectoral a little naore than Vj as broad as long, with nearly straight distal 

 and outer margins, rounded corners, and wide base. 



Color. Light gray-brown above, darkest along back, snout, and on upper sides of 

 pectorals, paling on the sides to grayish white on belly and on lower sides of fins 5 sides 

 of trunk rearward from pectorals as well as caudal and dorsals variously marked with 

 roundish to oval spots, varying in color from yellowish brown to ochre yellow. In a speci- 

 men 100 cm. in total length these spots vary from less than V2 cm. to more than iVs cm. 

 in diameter, numbering upwards of lOO. Posterior margins of fins edged with black on 

 some specimens but perhaps not on all. 



Size. In the northern sector of their American range, from Delaware Bay to Cape 

 Cod, Sand Sharks are recorded from 3 feet to about 9 feet, the great majority of those 

 caught being immature, of perhaps 4 to 6 feet. Large adults (7 to 8 feet or more) are also 

 reported, not rarely, from widely scattered localities along the New Jersey coast, from the 

 vicinity of New York, from Clinton, Connecticut (8 feet 10 inches), and especially from 

 the vicinity of Nantucket, where commercial operations in the early nineteen-twenties are 

 said to have yielded "a wealth of eight and nine foot Sand sharks.'"' From North 

 Carolina southward, however, large ones alone have been reported, the recorded lengths 

 ranging from about 8 to 9 feet in the Beaufort-Cape Lookout region; 6V2. to 9^/2 feet for 

 Charleston, South Carolina; 9 feet 2 inches to 10 feet 5 inches for southwestern Florida 

 at Englewood, the last named being the greatest length yet positively recorded for Car- 

 charias taurus. The recorded weight of about 250 pounds for an 8-foot lO-inch specimen 

 from Clinton, Connecticut, shows how much lighter a fish this is, length for length, than 

 the Mackerel Shark, Mako or White Shark. We have no firsthand information to con- 

 tribute. 



It appears, from the state of sexual development of the specimens we have seen, and 

 from the sizes of the few females so far reported as containing eggs or embryos, that this 

 Shark does not mature until it attains a length of perhaps seven feet or upward. 



Developmental Stages. Females have been reported containing many eggs as well as 

 embryos. 



Habits. In spite of its trim appearance and voracious appetite (see below) this is a 

 comparatively sluggish shark, living mostly on or close to bottom, being more active and 

 biting the hook more freely by night than by day. It is a coastwise species, as contrasted 

 with pelagic, most of those caught being taken in depths of not more than two to five 

 fathoms; and it is often encountered close in to the tide line in only two to six feet of water, 

 hence its frequent capture in pound nets. It has not been reported from the fishing banks 

 off Nantucket or at the mouth of the Gulf of Maine. To the southward, however, it may 

 not be so strictly confined, witness its presence on the North Carolina Banks. 



Knowledge of its breeding habits is confined to the facts that a large female, taken at 

 Beaufort, North Carolina, in April contained many large eggs; also that specimens a little 



18. Young and Mazet, Shark, Shark, 1933: 132. 



