Introducing Sharks, Skates, Rays, and Chimaeras 15
typus (in its own family, the Rhincodontidae). Whale Sharks have been mea-
sured at 12.6 m (41 ft) long and 12,000 kg (26,500 lb) in weight. A Whale
Shark caught off Anping, Taiwan, in 1994 reportedly weighed 35,800 kg
(79,000 lb) and appears to be the largest specimen ever recorded. Larger
individuals have been seen or caught, with reported lengths of 16 m (55 ft)
and 18 m (60 ft), but these claims have not been verified. An 18-m (60-ft)
Whale Shark could weigh 34,000 kg (75,000 lb), so the Anping shark could
have been close to that length. Regardless, these sizes make Whale Sharks
the longest shark that has ever lived. The second largest shark is the Bask-
ing Shark, Cetorhinus maximus (also in its own family, the Cetorhinidae),
which may get to be 10 m (33 ft) long and 4,000 kg (8,800 lb). Both Whale
and Basking sharks feed mainly on plankton and small fishes.
Sleeper sharks (Somniosus) are also very large sharks. Pacific Sleeper
Sharks (Somniosus pacificus) are reported to reach lengths of up to 7.6 m
(25 ft), but the largest one measured was 4.4 m (14 ft) long. The Green-
land Shark, Somniosus microcephalus, is thought to grow to 6.4 m (21 ft) and
1,000 kg (2,200 lb), and possibly up to 7.3 m (24 ft). Tiger Sharks, Galeo-
cerdo cuvier, come close, with the largest reliably measured at 5.5 m (18 ft)
in length (estimated weight 1,418 kg, or 3,120 lb), although another Tiger
Shark, caught in 1957, was reported to be 7.4 m (24 ft) long and weighed
3,110 kg (6,860 lb). Great Hammerhead Sharks, Sphyrna mokarran, also
grow large, with the longest reported length at 6.1 m (20 ft) and a recog-
nized world record weight of 450 kg (991 lb).
And of course there is the White Shark, Carcharodon carcharias, about
which misinformation abounds. Many “true accounts” of giant White
Sharks have appeared over the years, with published sizes (in newspapers)
of up to 36.5 ft (11.1 m; that one was a typographical error—the fish was
actually only 16.5 ft, or 5 m, long). Other claims for 9-m (29-ft) and 7-m
(23-ft) White Sharks have also turned out to be exaggerations. The largest
White Shark reliably measured was either a 5.9-m-long (19.5-ft) female
caught off Ledge Point, Western Australia, in 1984 or a 6.1-m-long (20.3-
ft) female captured off Prince Edward Island in August 1983. The heaviest
reliably measured White Shark was a 3,427-lb (1,560-kg), 17-ft (5.2-m) fe-
male captured off Montauk Point, New York, in 1986. (A 20-ft- or 6.1-m-
long shark would weigh closer to 4,200 lb, or 1,900 kg.) Based on the width
of bite marks on dead whales, and recognizing that mouth width is a good
(but not exact) indicator of body length, modern White Sharks may reach
6.4 m (21 ft) long, and some reasonable accounts put that number at 7 m
(23 ft). However, none that large have been caught and carefully measured,
despite what you may read in popular books, in magazines, and on web-
sites.
At the other end of the size spectrum are some decidedly small sharks,