False catshark

How it lives

A slow, sluggish shark. An oil-filled liver of about 18 to 25% of its body weight lets it hover near the seabed with little effort. Females give birth to live young after the embryos feed on yolk, unfertilised eggs and uterine milk. Litters are 2 to 4 pups of about 70 to 140 cm. Pregnancy is probably longer than a year, possibly two to three years. Its lifespan is not known.

Where it goes

Lives near the bottom on deep slopes, seamounts, ridges and deep reefs, from about 100 m to nearly 1,900 m and most often at 500 to 1,400 m. Its day-to-day movements are not well described.

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

IUCN lists it as Least Concern. FishBase gives an assessment date of March 2023, and earlier references cite 2015. It lives in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific oceans, with most records from the Northern Hemisphere. I found no population estimate. Pitcairn Islands: in 2012, drop cameras at 21 sites between 78 and 1,585 m recorded a false catshark, one of the rare deep species named in the 2014 survey paper. It appeared only in the deepest zone, 800 to 1,600 m.