Under the ice lurks a 'strange' Arctic monster

Published: Tuesday, May 06, 2008

 
Canadian fish scientists are opening a window into the mysterious world of the Greenland shark -- the top predator in the Canadian Arctic about which almost nothing is known.
 
Except this, says Steve Campana of the Bedford Institute of Oceanography: "These are very, very strange sharks."
 
Its meat is poison. Its mouth is far under its body. It has almost no spine. It's so lethargic that it doesn't even snap at the scientists who hook it and attach a radio to it.
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And it may live 200 years.
 
Mr. Campana and Aaron Fisk of the University of Windsor took their team to the sea ice 300 kilometres north of Iqaluit, camping out in a frigid plywood shed in April to tag and release Greenland sharks.
 
Only one other big shark in the world is almost unknown -- the extremely rare deep-ocean "megamouth."
 
Why study the Greenland shark?
 
In the eastern Arctic "this is the apex (top) predator, the king of the food web, along with the polar bear. There's a sister species in the western Arctic. And as with any ecosystem, if you don't know anything about the apex predator, you're in a lot of trouble figuring out what's going on."
 
Everything about this fish is odd, Mr. Campana says.
 
"They are really the antithesis to the fast-swimming great white and mako (sharks)."
 
The cold water might make them slow, but even in warmer water they just cruise along the bottom, slurping up fish, and occasionally seals. The seals may be dead when the sharks eat them. No one really knows.
 
Researchers are hoping that samples of bone may hint at a fish's age; the team will look for radioactive elements released during atmospheric tests of nuclear weapons, to show which fish were alive in the 1960s.
 
The Greenland shark can grow to eight metres and has hundreds of sharp teeth.
 
"Just running your hand lightly along them you can slice yourself wide open," says Mr. Campana.