Great lanternshark
Big Black dogfish ( Etmopterus princeps)
The Great Black dogfish ( Etmopterus princeps) is a shark from the family of lantern sharks ( Etmopteridae ). The range of the species ranges in the north east Atlantic from southern Iceland over the Faroe Islands, the Hebrides, the coasts of the British Isles, the English Channel and the Bay of Biscay to the coast of Mauritania. On the East Coast, the shark of Nova Scotia to New Jersey occurs.
Appearance and characteristics
The Great Black dogfish reaches a maximum length of 75 centimeters. He has a typical for the lantern sharks elongated body with a broad flattened head and upper side. The teeth in the upper jaw have four to seven peaks. The body color is uniformly dark brown without any reductions. On the ventral side, it has the typical for the lantern sharks tiny luminous organs which produce a greenish glow in living animals.
An anal fin is absent, the two dorsal fins are preceded by the proper typical spines. The first dorsal fin starts behind the pectoral fins. It's smaller and shallower than the second and has a small mandrel while the mandrel of the second dorsal fin is strongly developed and as high as the fin. Like all species of the family owned pets five gill slits and an injection hole behind the eye.
Way of life
The Great Black dogfish lives close to the ground on the continental shelf and the continental slopes at depths of 300-2200 meters. It feeds on small fish, cephalopods and crustaceans. About his life are very little data. He is like other species of the order viviparous ( ovoviviparous ).
Endangering
The IUCN states in their Red List, that there are insufficient data available to assess the level of danger of Etmopterus princeps .. The species is bycatch in this fishery.