Nurse Shark Size report

As we all know, sharks are very ferocious marine animals. You have heard of a marine animal called nurse sharks; they are completely different from the sharks you know. The nurse shark (scientific name: Ginglymostoma cirratum) is a docile species found in the Atlantic Ocean's tropical coastal and subtropical waters.

Nurse sharks, like benthic sharks, often spend more time resting during the day and move slowly and sluggishly. They are opportunistic ambush predators and usually prey on slower animals, including small fish, crustaceans (crabs, lobsters, etc.), squid, and octopus.

Nurse sharks often inhabit under the rocks on the seafloor, lazily sluggish swimmers, very wonderful and docile species. Many divers are so fond of this shark that they can get up close, swim, and play with them. The following article will introduce you to this shark species with a peculiar mouth.

Nurse Shark Size And Characteristics

Nurse sharks have smooth gray-brown skin that sets them apart from other sharks. Adult sharks generally vary in color from light to dark brown. Juvenile sharks under 55 cm have small black spots with areas of lighter pigmentation surrounding each spot and covering the entire body; these are lighter and darker bands of pigmentation along the dorsal surface. Young sharks (70-120 cm) have limited color variation.

Nurse sharks have separate dentitions, the simplest arrangement of teeth in sharks, with no overlap between teeth. Nurse sharks can generate the strongest suction of all aquatic vertebrates to date from their mouths. If the prey is too large to swallow, they will suck the food into pieces and eat it slowly; some tough crustaceans cannot escape the tiger's mouth, and they can even suck the meat of the conch directly out of the shell. Despite their sluggish appearance, they devour benthic creatures at an alarming rate.

Average Size of Nurse Shark

Body length at birth is about 27-30 cm. They can get quite large with a length of up to 4.5 meters (15 ft) as adults. Nurse sharks have an average length between 2.3-3 meters (7.5-10 ft) and an overall weight of 91-150 kg (200-330 lbs). Female nurse sharks are about 2.3-2.4 meters in full-grow size, and males are about 2.1-2.2 meters at maturity.

Living Habits

Sharks usually prefer to fight alone, and the nurse shark is one of the most social species in the ocean. Nurse sharks are nocturnal undersea scavengers and are mainly active at night, so they swim slowly during the day at a speed of about 2.4 km/h; while hunting, they can burst at a speed of 40 km/h. Their prey is usually snorting fish, crustaceans, and mollusks. They often rest on the seabed or in caves during the day, and sometimes a group of forty nurse sharks rests together and gathers together. Some are specially responsible for guarding to prevent the invasion of predatory and ferocious sharks such as bull sharks.

Lifespan and Reproduction

The adult age is 15-20 years for females and 10-15 years for males. Reaming sharks are ovoviviparous and have a reproductive cycle of once every two years. After mating, gestation takes 5-6 months. Young sharks are born in late spring or early summer, and litter size is 20-30. The typical lifespan of the Nurse Shark is 15-25 years.

Different males will attempt to mate with the same female, resulting in the female bearing many scars and bruises from the male's bite. Females often try to avoid contact with males by swimming in shallow water, where they can bury their pectoral fins in the sand.

Final Words

As with all sharks, this giant fish is incredibly interesting and important to the delicate marine ecosystem, especially near fragile coral reefs. Nurse sharks are slow-moving bottom-dwellers and are, for the most part, harmless to humans. Although this species is not on the special protection list, it is vulnerable to disturbance in areas with constant human activity. In the eastern Pacific, numbers have fallen sharply. In the southernmost tip of Brazil, it is considered extinct.