The Blue Shark

The blue shark is easily recognized out of all sharks because of its dark indigo back, the light blue on its sides, and a bright white stomach. The blue shark has a poker straight body with a pointy snout. The lower jaw on a blue shark is distinctly further back then its upper jaw. The blue shark only reaches about 13 feet in length, but they appear smaller because of their slender bodies. With its razor sharp triangular teeth, the blue shark could deliver a rather nasty bite to its prey. The blue shark is a carnivore, so its teeth are designed to rip through meat (the flesh on its prey.) The teeth on a blue shark are serrated on the tops just proving that the blue is in deed a carnivore.

The diet of a blue shark is a wide variety of fish, squid, and ocean creatures (including other sharks.) When the blue shark catches its prey, it uses its teeth to snatch it from the salty waters and rip pieces of the flesh off its bones. A blue sharks diet includes: cod, silver hake, white hake, mackerel, tuna, swordfish, red hake, butterfish, and haddock.

The blue shark enjoys swimming deep in tropical waters where the temperature stays around 7-16 degrees Celsius. Blue sharks are found in the Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, and the Pacific Ocean, but they usually stay in open waters rather then shallow.

The blue shark is not a known man eater. There have been reported attacks on humans from the blue shark, but none on a blue shark actually killing and eating a person. When a blue shark attacks, it’s usually when they’re in shallow waters looking for food or giving birth.

The female blue shark can have babies when it reaches about 11 feet in length. The blue shark delivers live pups, baby sharks, after about 12 months of pregnancy. The newborn pups usually range 18-20″ in length. The average size of a blue shark’s litter is 25-50 pups, and the mother cares for them all. A blue shark pup will leave its mother when it’s about 3-4 feet in length. The blue shark is not a mammal, so it doesn’t feed its pups milk, the pup must learn how to hunt and kill its food at an early age. Blue shark pups die rapidly at an early age, too. This death is usually caused by predators or illness.

The blue shark wonders through out the ocean, day after day, looking for food. When a blue shark swims, the salty waters remove anything that may be stuck to the shark’s gills. If a blue shark can’t swim, it will die from lack of food and/or lack of oxygen.

The main threat to the blue shark right now is: Fishing nets, larger sharks, and fishermen.
The blue shark is hunted for its dorsal fin. People remove a blue sharks dorsal fin to show as a trophy. It is their proof that they caught and killed a blue shark. The blue shark is also a very popular shark for shark soup. When a blue shark is caught by fishermen, they usually kill them and make a shark soup from their meat.

The lives journey of a blue sharks ends usually at the age of 20. They spend all their lives swimming in the wide open oceans, and helping us by keeping the ocean populations at a normal rate.