East Coast: Caribbean: Bull Shark

Please comment!!!!

Bull Sharks

Follow this for link to picture!


Now these guys I think are the real "Jaws". They are found anywhere in coastal warm waters and even found in the Amazon River. Their kidneys help their salt levels stay the same when they go into fresh water by controlling how much salt is taking out of their body through their blood (check out this article by Shark Savers, great way to explain it). Because of this special ability, that is why I think they are the real "Jaws" because they can go anywhere and they do not like anything in their territory.

And in the movie "Jaws" when they say shark attacks can happen in three foot of water, yes it can. This Bull kept knocking into the guy on purpose to see who the heck was in it's space:

Link for Video
(I apologize that the video quality is poor so follow the link for a better video)

 So why don't like they like anything in their territory? Well it's because they are very aggressive species of shark. They have higher testosterone levels than any other shark so the females can be a little aggressive because the extra sex hormones in their body, but the males are super aggressive! That's why they are just jerks if you ask me. People think Great Whites are scary and bad, but it's really these guys because they are so aggressive. They are the shark with the highest rate of shark attacks (even though one site earlier said otherwise, I think they need to look more into that) not Great Whites.

Map of where they can be found:

Link for Picture

But as side to the high testosterone, there is still a lot about this species of shark. These species of shark grow a little over 6 feet, but don't get as long as male Great Whites (13 feet if you remember!). The cool thing about these sharks is that their gestation is just a month longer from ours and again like other species of shark have a bunch of pups! Like other species of shark, they are endangered again because of fishing. Nevertheless, even though I think these sharks are jerks, they are pretty special. But if I were you, I would observe these sharks from a safety of a boat.

Some more info to look at (National Geographic)

Next Time: A Thank You (but not done yet), and then come back to the Caribbean.