88 Commercial Shark Fishing in the Caribbean Area 



Figure 28 



Genus Eulamia, Requiem Sharks. 



Figure 28. Eulamia limbatus, Small Black-Tipped Shark. 



Description: Among- the members of the genus in which the 

 back does not have a ridge, limbatus resembles tnaculipinms (Fig- 

 ure 29) in its conspicuously black-tipped fins and in the fact that 

 its upper teeth toward the center of its mouth are slender, erect 

 and symmetrical. It differs from maculipinnis, however, by its 

 relatively larger eyes, by its shorter gill openings, by the fact 

 that the free rear tip of its second dorsal is less slender, and by 

 the fact that the edges of its lower and upper teeth are regular 

 though finely serrate. (They are smooth in maculipinnis). 



Color: Dark gray, dusky bronze or ashy blue above; white 

 (pure or yellowish) below, with a band of the dark upper color 

 extending backward along each side, and with the pale hue of the 

 lower parts extending forward. In the adult, the pectorals are 

 conspicuously tipped with black. In young specimens the dorsals, 

 the anal and the lower lobe of the caudal are also tipped with 

 black. 



Size: Maturing at 4 to 5 feet, adults average about 5^ to 

 6]/ 2 feet. Few grow longer than 7 feet, with 8 feet about the 

 maximum. Recorded weights are about 4 pounds at 28 inches, 

 about 20 pounds at 4 feet, about 42 pounds at 5 feet, and 68 pounds 

 at about S]/ 2 feet. 



Habits: Very active and swift, often seen in schools at the 

 surface and frequently leaping clear of the water; encountered 

 indifferently near shore and far out at sea. It feeds chiefly on 

 the smaller kinds of schooling fishes but sometimes attacks sting 

 rays, evidenced by the discovery of their spines embedded in its 

 jaws. It appears that the young are born chiefly in late spring. 



Range: Tropical and subtropical Atlantic from southern Brazil 

 to North Carolina and straying occasionally as far as southern 

 New England in the western side; also eastern tropical Pacific 

 from lower California to Peru. One of the commoner sharks 

 among the Bahamas, around southern Florida, and in the northern 

 part of the Gulf of Mexico. It is undoubtedly equally widespread 

 (and locally common) in the southern part of the Gulf, southward 

 along the coast of Brazil, and throughout the Caribbean-West 

 Indian region in general where it has been recorded from many 

 localities. 



