Brownie shark: a creepy inhabitant of the deep sea (8 photos)

This shark, which lives at great depths, is perhaps the most unusual of all representatives of the shark family. It got its name for its bizarre appearance: its snout ends in a long beak-like outgrowth, and its jaws can extend quite far.





When scientists say that the ocean has been studied very little, please take their word for it! Because today no one really knows what creatures are there at the bottom. See for yourself: a couple of decades ago, scientists thought that the maximum dimensions of goblin sharks were 3 meters in length and about 200 kilograms in weight. Until in 2023, fishermen caught a giant shark 5 meters long and weighing a ton!

The goblin shark, Scapanorhynchus, Mitsekurina, or Goblin shark is the most extraordinary representative of the order Lamniformes. It is a distant relative of great white sharks, but looks completely strange: a flabby elongated body, a large rounded tail fin and the cherry on top - a creepy nosed muzzle with retractable jaws. Because of such an extraordinary appearance and the elusiveness of these fish, scientists have long debated their taxonomy and evolutionary history.



Yes, sharks are found throughout almost the entire world's oceans - they have been caught from Florida itself to the shores of East Africa and New Zealand. Even so, Mitsekurin are extremely difficult to observe. The fact is that critters live at depths from 40 to 1370 meters, but are most often found between 270 and 960 meters. Well, in captivity, house sharks live very little. The record was set by an individual who lived for a whole week in the aquarium of the University of Tokyo. Of course, few people can rise from such a bottom and immediately adapt to living conditions on the surface!



Look



The shark subtly tells the diver to turn off the lights.

Therefore, all current data on goblin sharks is based on the study of a small number of freshly caught carcasses and a handful of museum exhibits. It’s good that science is not standing still now, because even with such a small amount of input data, ichthyologists were still able to unearth the secrets of the Mitsekurin family tree. Genetic studies have shown that our heroines are one of the oldest representatives of the class of cartilaginous fish. The living fossil appeared approximately 125 million years ago, somewhere in the Cretaceous period. Perhaps one of the early goblin sharks was personally acquainted with a T. rex or a mosasaurus...



Photos of the goblin shark are so rare that you can more often see drawings of them than real footage.

Or maybe he wasn’t - it’s unlikely that anyone other than another goblin shark would like a nosed muzzle with scary retractable jaws. By the way, why did the sharks choose such a strange outfit? You won't be able to impress anyone at the bottom like that; there are even worse creatures there! Jokes aside, but in fact the shark’s snout serves quite practical purposes. Their long spade-shaped nose-rostrum is stuffed with ampullae of Lorenzini. These special cells form a dense network that picks up electrical impulses from living things. The best thing is in the pitch darkness of deep water!



Sharks, according to scientists, chose the calmest hunting tactics - simply drifting with the current towards their prey. And when the distance to food becomes minimal, predators use their jaws.



The mechanism for throwing them out is very simple: only two pairs of elastic ligaments. They are attached under tension to the joint of the lower jaw. When the goblin wants to bite, the ligaments relax, and both jaws are sharply thrown forward at a speed of 3.14 m/s. At the same time, the lower jaw moves a little faster, as if swinging to strike.





At this rate, predators, albeit slowly, but surely and quite successfully, hunted for millions of years. One thing remains a mystery - how these fear people make children. The first pregnant female was caught only in 2023, but so far there is no information on her. Using the example of other sharks of this order,Scientists suggest that Scapanorhynchus may be viviparous with a small number of offspring, which during pregnancy feed on unfertilized eggs or their brothers directly inside the womb.



There is no targeted hunting for goblin sharks, because they do not represent any commercial interest. Unless a certain number of individuals are caught as bycatch - but this is the case with everyone now. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the number of these fish, although not reliably known, is not a cause for concern. Although this wording itself already causes concern - we don’t know how many fish are left, but let’s not bother!