Species Spotlight: Angelshark

Edge Zine

24 May

Written By Jack Bojan

Species spotlight:

A Welsh celebrity with whiskers? Has to be the Angelshark. They’re one of the most unique species in the UK, and they have some similar behaviours to us.

Names & Nicknames: Angelshark, Common angelshark, Angel fiddle fish, Angelpuffy fish, Escat juea, Fiddle fish

Size: Male Angelsharks come in at a respectable 1.8 metres, but the ladies are the real showstoppers, coming in at 2.4 metres and weighing up to 80kg. That’s as heavy as Barack Obama, Angelshark for president?

Smell: Heard the rumour that sharks can smell a drop of blood from a mile away? Well, that’s not true... It’s more like they can smell a drop of blood in an area of water the size of a small swimming pool. That’s still a pretty impressive schnozz! Angelsharks are no different; they use a very sensitive snout to sense prey and help locate mates during breeding season.

Communication: Communicate? Why would you want to talk with anyone when you could just chill by yourself on the sea floor? In all seriousness, Angelsharks will, of course, communicate with the world around them; scientists just aren't too sure how that works at the moment.

Favourite Hangout: Angelsharks are benthic, a fancy science word that means they like to chill by the sea floor. This is where all the soft mud and sand is – perfect for burying themselves in to disguise themselves as they lie in wait for their prey.

Back view of an angelshark swimming along the sea floor

Favourite Snack: Fish, plain and simple. They do like to mix it up, though, snacking on the occasional crustacean or mollusc and, in one case, even a diving cormorant (a bird)!

Eating Habits: Service! True masters of waiting for the food to come to them. Angelsharks will spend hours or even days submerged in the sand, waiting for a tasty snack to get close enough. And when it does, BAM, that unsuspecting fish is snapped up in a tenth of a second.

Love Language: That riding solo life. This species spends most of its time alone, so it can get a bit tetchy around mating season. Males will bite onto a female's pectoral fin and drag them up off the bottom of the seafloor; how charming...

If you see them: Then you've got some hawk-like eyes! As this species spends most of its time buried in sand, coupled with the fact that numbers are so low, they can make for a rare site indeed. You have nothing to fear if you do see one however, just like with all sharks, the actual likelihood of an attack is extremely low, just leave them be and they will leave you be!

Red Flags: Superman has kryptonite and Angelsharks have trawler nets. These incredibly destructive fishing nets scrape against the seafloor, damaging the ecosystem and collecting anything in their path, including the Angelsharks that hang out down there. Once this happens, it's game over for the poor Angelshark.

Epic Journeys: For an animal that loves resting on the seafloor, they're big on travelling. Angelsharks in the north will move to warmer waters when it gets chilly, and other populations will move between shallower and deeper waters, though there is a lot about Angelshark movements that we still don’t understand.

Glow-up: A 2.4-metre shark tends not to have many predators, and that is certainly the case for Angelsharks. However, it can be a tough world out there for a junior, so they have a row of spines to help them deter any would-be predators. These spines do disappear as they grow, as there is no need for them when you are at the top!

Who are they in the friendship group: You aren’t sure – you never see them.

How threatened are they: Critically Endangered