The Great White Shark By tu

Endangered Species Great White Sharks now more endangered than tigers with just 3,500 left in the oceans. Even though they are known as one of the deadliest creatures on earth they rarely attack people and usually do by accident. They were made infamous by the film Jaws that many people have watched. Another movie with sharks in it is Finding Nemo. With their shark Bruce. Bruce is a Great White Shark. Great whites are decreasing in numbers and are rare due to years of being hunted by man. They are a protected species along the coasts of California, USA, Australia, and South Africa.

What they eat Great white sharks are carnivorous (meat eater) and love to feast on animals with very high fat contents. Great white sharks eat fish, tuna, stingrays, smaller sharks, porpoises, dolphins, whales, seals, fur seals, sea lions and have also been known to eat turtles.

How they find their prey Great white sharks primarily locate their prey based on smell and sound. They can hear and smell their prey from many kilometres away and start to move towards their prey. When close to their prey they rely on their sight to spot their prey. Great white sharks normally stay below their prey and ambush them, taking them by complete surprise. Great white sharks normally attack their prey in the morning because it is harder to see the sharks at the bottom of the ocean in the morning.

Interesting facts Fact 1: Great white sharks have been known to attack and even sink boats up to 10m long! Fact 2: Great white sharks live in water where the temperature is between 12°C and 25°C (54°F to 78°F).

Physical Appearance Great white sharks can be as long as 6m (20ft). They weigh up to 2,200kg (nearly 5,000lb) They have 5 gill slits to help them breath. Only the underbelly of the great white shark is actually white, its top surface is grey to blue grey. Great whites average 12-16 feet long (3.7-4.9 m) long. The biggest great white shark on record was 23 feet (7 m) long, weighing about 7,000 pounds (3200 kg). Females are larger than males, as with most sharks. Shark pups can be over 5 feet (1.5 m) long at birth.  The great white's nostrils can smell one drop of blood in 25 gallons (100 litres) of water. Shark nostrils are only used for smell and not for breathing, like our nostrils. They breathe using gills, not nostrils.

Physical Appearance 2 They have 5 fins that help them do different things, the First dorsal fin, Second dorsal fin, Pectoral fin, Pelvic fin and the Caudal fin. The great white is the only type of shark that will go to the surface and poke its head up out of the water. No one knows exactly why it does this; perhaps it is to see potential prey such as surface-dwelling sea lions. 

Migration and Swimming In the fall, some females migrate to warmer waters (for example, southern California) to give birth.  Great whites are propelled through the water by their powerful tails. The fins are only used for balance. Their movement is more like an aircraft's flight than other fishes swimming. They average about 2 mph (3.2 kph) but can swim 15 miles per hour (24 kph) in short bursts. They swim constantly or they will sink since, like other sharks, they have no gas filled swim bladder to keep them afloat like bony fish do. Like other sharks, their large, oily liver provides some buoyancy (floating ability). but they are still heavier than water and will sink unless they are propelling themselves through the water. Also like other sharks, they cannot swim backwards or even come to an abrupt stop, because their fins are not flexible like other fish. In order to go backwards, they must stop swimming and fall backwards, using gravity to propel themselves backwards. It has been recently discovered that great white sharks can jump out of the water. They jump into the air from deep water in order to catch fast-swimming seals  Great white sharks don't travel in groups or schools very often. Sometimes they can be seen traveling in pairs.

Life Span It is believed great white sharks live from 30-40 years but this is still unknown. No one knows the life span of the great white shark. Some people estimate it to be about 100 years, but this has not been proven.

Distribution Great white sharks have been observed along the coastlines of California to Alaska, the east coast of the USA and most of the Gulf coast, Hawaii, most of South America, South Africa, Australia (except the north coast), our country New Zealand, the Mediterranean Sea, West Africa to Scandinavia, Japan, and the eastern coastline of China and southern Russia.

Breeding Great white sharks reproduce via aplacental viviparity. They give birth to 2-14 fully-formed pups that are up to 5 feet (1.5 m) long. Like all sharks, fertilization of the eggs occurs within the female. The eggs hatch within the female and are nourished by eating unfertilized eggs and smaller siblings in the womb. There is no placenta to nourish the babies - they must fend for themselves, even before birth. They swim away from the mother immediately after birth, there is no maternal care-giving. 

Change The great white shark was added to the endangered list because its population has dropped due to the unregulated trade and excessive hunting. The great white shark is the top predator of the ocean and it is not killed by any other predator in the ocean. However, humans have killed a great number of white sharks to get their teeth and jaws for trading and their meat for pills. These are all changes in the marine environment for the Great White Shark that are bad. To stop this anyone and everyone could try and get the message out to stop hunting for sharks and every other marine animal in the sea by writing letters, and emails to anyone who can do something major about this e.g., the city council.

The End Thanks for watching but now it is The End