Facts for Discovery Channel’s shark week
Ten things you didn’t know about the amazing world of sharks:
- Sharks have been in our oceans for four hundred million years, even before the dinosaurs!
- Sharks enhance the gene pool, as they pick off weak prey, leaving the strong to reproduce.
- Sharks hold the underwater world in balance by keeping populations of other species under control, e.g. octopus and squid
- Sharks have seven senses compared to mammals that have five
- Some species of shark must keep swimming forward in order to breath and therefore, are never stationary
- Whale sharks are the largest fish in the ocean reaching up to 10 metres but only eat tiny plankton
- Sharks have a ‘conveyor belt’ of teeth. If one tooth falls out, another moves forward to replace it
- Sharks do not have any bones in their bodies. Instead, their skeletons are made of cartilage (the same as our ears)
- Some sharks lay eggs, while others give birth
- The spiny dog fish (the smallest shark) is pregnant for around two years before giving birth
To read more about sharks, please click here.
