Two sharks in one day

TWO sharks recently visited the MarinaBaja.

One, a bluntnose sixgill shark commonly known as the cow shark, was washed up in Albir where it was found early in the morning by two beach cleaners.

The 2.7-metre shark was probably young as an adult grows to around 5 metres, municipal biologist Jose Manuel Perez believed.  It had been dead for around 15 hours but bore no external wounds and possibly died from the same virus that has recently killed dolphins, Perez said. The harmless cow shark, which would normally live at a greater depth, could also have approached the shore in search of fish.

It was winched from the beach by the Policia Local and later collected by Valencia University biologists.

The other, a four-metre thresher shark weighing 109 kilos, was caught in the nets of Benidorm fishing boat, La Cartagenera, as it trawled a few kilometres from the coast.  It later fetched €3 a kilo at Villajoyosa’s fish market. 

Like the cow sharks, threshers usually live in deep waters but come to the Sierra Helada zone to spawn and are often caught by local trawlers.