RESEARCH ARTICLE
How to Kill Another Shark: A First Inside Look at a Potential Hunting Strategy of the Galapagos Shark
Erich K. Ritter1, 2, *, Alberto Munoz3
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2018Volume: 11
First Page: 46
Last Page: 51
Publisher Id: TOFISHSJ-11-46
DOI: 10.2174/1874401X01811010046
Article History:
Received Date: 11/7/2018Revision Received Date: 30/9/2018
Acceptance Date: 1/10/2018
Electronic publication date: 30/11/2018
Collection year: 2018
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
Close-up videos of sharks foraging on other live sharks are rare, especially when it comes to footage of the entire duration of an event.
Objective:
Our goal was to present an in-depth analysis involving a Galapagos shark, Carcharhinus galapagensis, foraging on a whitetip reef shark, Triaenodon obesus.
Method:
A frame by frame video examination was used to highlight the different aspects of this bout.
Results:
Several behavioral characteristics, including the somewhat cryptic approach, the extensive shaking once the Galapagos shark had the whitetip reef shark between its jaws, and devouring tail-first, stand out in this event.
Conclusion:
The entire act appeared very smooth, indicating that this bout, or at least parts thereof, may represent a common hunting strategy for Galapagos sharks.
