330 Shark and Company 



dangerous to man, a proved attacker of human beings." One of the 

 largest on record— 12 feet long, 890 pounds— was caught in 1936 by 

 Zane Grey off Bateman's Bay, New South Wales. "Of all the attacks on 

 human beings recorded from Austrahan waters," writes T. C. Rough- 

 ley,^ "there have been two occasions only when some portion of the 

 body of the person attacked has been found in the stomach of a shark 

 captured shortly afterwards; both were Black Whalers." 



The South Australian whaler or Cocktail shark {Carcharh'miis greyi 

 Owen, 1853) is found in the waters of southern and southwestern Aus- 

 tralia. Little is known of it, except for the fact that it appears to be a 

 relatively small shark which frequently ascends the Swan River, near 

 Perth, Australia. Its river-swimming habits have earned for it the addi- 

 tional common name of Swan River whaler. 



Other species include the Brown and the Bronze whalers which are 

 rated as potentially very dangerous. A 14-foot Bronze whaler killed a 

 spearfisherman off Normanville Beach, south of Adelaide, in December, 

 1962. 



Silky Shark 

 (Carcharhimis florid amis Bigelow, Schroeder and Springer, 1943) 



This shark, common in both the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans, is 

 another of the larger— 8 to 10 feet— of the Carcharhinid family, and a 

 good example of how little we still know about sharks. 



Despite its abundance and its size, it was not scientifically pinned 

 down until 1943 in the Atlantic and 1953 in the Pacific. "That a shark 

 so common, so large and so easily recognized should have continued 

 unknown for so long casts an unflattering light on the scientific knowl- 

 edge of the group to which it belongs," say Bigelow and Schroeder. 



Fishermen have long known it in Puerto Rico, Cuba, and around 

 southern Florida in the Atlantic, and offshore in the warm waters of the 

 Pacific. It is called the Silky shark because its denticles are so small 

 that its skin feels smooth to the touch. 



The Silky shark is sometimes confused in the Atlantic with a similar 

 big shark {Carcharhimis falciformis Miiller and Henle, 1841). But the 

 Silky shark's pectorals are much longer, its eye is smaller, and the tip 

 of its snout is narrower. Both sharks have a ridge that runs down the 

 back between the first and second dorsal fins. 



Cub Shark 



(Carcharhifius leiicas Miiller and Henle, 1841) 



(Also Known as Bull Shark, Ground Shark, Requiem Shark) 



From May through July, drawn by one of those strange stirrings of 



instinct that govern the realm of nature, female Cub sharks converge 



2 T. C. Roughley, Fish and Fisheries of Australia (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 

 1951). 



