KZN In Hi-Tech Project To Breed Sharks

November 15, 2007

Release from: Tony Carnie
The Mercury (South Africa)

Natal Sharks Board and Australian scientists hope to breed ragged-tooth sharks in artificial, plastic wombs in Durban, as part of a ground-breaking shark conservation project.

If the experiment works, the embryonic, laboratory-reared shark pups will be sent to Australia to strengthen the denuded population of ragged-tooths along the Great Barrier Reef and the New South Wales coastline.

Two senior Australian scientists are in Durban to discuss the project with their colleagues at the Natal Sharks Board. They also hope to recruit two masters students from the University of KwaZulu-Natal to assist them.

Natal Sharks Board chief Graeme Charter described the proposal as a world first, which held great potential to increase scientific knowledge about the biology of ragged-tooth sharks, as well as about climate change and ocean temperatures.

Hunting and fishing have left ragged-tooth sharks critically endangered along the eastern coastline of Australia, and scientists fear they are headed for extinction unless their population numbers can be dramatically improved.

Nick Otway, a senior research scientist with the New South Wales department of primary industries, said the artificial breeding project was considered essential because raggies did not breed well in captivity and cannibalism in the uterus was a problem.

Unborn ragged-tooth sharks eat their siblings in the womb, reducing the number of pups that are finally born.

But if the pups can be removed from the shark's uterus and raised in an artificial womb, it may be possible to boost the population.