Requiem Shark
Requiem sharks are a family, Carcharhinidae, of sharks in the order Carcharhiniformes, containing migratory, live-bearing sharks of warm seas (sometimes of brackish or fresh water) such as the tiger shark, the blue shark, the bull shark, and the milk shark.
The name may be related to the French word for shark, requin, itself of disputed etymology (chien de mer or Latin requiem ("rest"), which would thereby create a cyclic etymology: requiem-requin-requiem.
Family members have the usual carcharhiniform characteristics. The eyes are round, and the pectoral fins are completely behind the five gill slits. Most species are viviparous, the young being born fully developed. They vary widely in size, from as little as 69 centimetres (2.26 ft) adult length in the Australian sharpnose shark, up to 5.5 metres (18 ft) adult length in the tiger shark.
Requiem sharks are responsible for a large proportion of attacks on humans; however, due to the difficulty in identifying individual species, there is a degree of inaccuracy in attack records.
Read more about Requiem Shark: Classification
Famous quotes containing the word shark:
“They will tell you tough stories of sharks all over the Cape, which I do not presume to doubt utterly,—how they will sometimes upset a boat, or tear it in pieces, to get at the man in it. I can easily believe in the undertow, but I have no doubt that one shark in a dozen years is enough to keep up the reputation of a beach a hundred miles long.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)