Blacknose shark

How it lives

Blacknose sharks give birth to live young, nourished through a placenta. Litters are small, usually one to six pups (NOAA says up to eight) after a gestation of roughly 8 to 11 months, and pups are born in shallow nursery areas such as coastal bays and mangroves. Newborns are 38 to 50 cm (15 to 20 in) long. Sharks mature at about 4 to 7 years. Estimates of maximum age are about 16 to 20 years, and tag-recapture work suggests up to about 23 years. Their life history is slow, so populations recover slowly.

Where it goes

Blacknose sharks show a strong attachment to home areas: juveniles and adults have been recorded returning to the same local area year after year. Off the south-eastern United States they move north in summer and south, or possibly offshore, in winter, and a similar pattern occurs in the Gulf of Mexico. Young sharks stay in shallow water, while adults prefer deeper water, usually 18 to 64 m. I found no movement data for the Caribbean.

We only draw a journey on the map when scientists have tracked it or clearly documented it. For this animal we have not found one yet.

Populations

The blacknose shark lives in the western Atlantic from North Carolina to southern Brazil, including the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean. The IUCN lists it as Endangered (2021; assessed 2019, criterion A2bd). FishBase rates its resilience as low (population doubling time 4.5 to 14 years). In United States waters, NOAA says the Atlantic stock is overfished and subject to overfishing (2011 assessment), although a rebuilding plan is promoting growth, and the status of the Gulf stock is unknown. Jamaica lies within its Caribbean range, but I did not find a published count or a record specific to Jamaica.