goblin sharks!!!

Chlidonias

Chlidonias

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I came across this video of a live goblin shark on youtube (check out its protrusible jaws!! Amazing footage!). Anyway, peaked my interest, and I found the following links to goblin sharks kept alive in Japan.
YouTube - Prehistoric Japanese Goblin Shark ALIVE

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On January 25, 2007, when our Tokyo Sea Life Park (Kasai Rinkai Suizokuen)'s staff took a boat with local fishermen, we caught a male goblin shark (Mitsukurina owstoni), 1.3m long, in the shallows (160 meters deep) of outer Tokyo Bay. We brought back the shark, which was fortunately not much damaged, and displayed it in a "Deep Sea" tank together with alfonsinos (Beryx splendens), and spiny dog fish (Squalus japonicus), but it died on January 27.

At first, the shark seemed nervous, swimming in the tank with one side upwards. But after a while, it began to swim normally and slowly, avoiding collision with tank walls and the acrylic window.
Click to expand...

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Goblin shark caught again!
Tokyo Sea Life Park, Apr 05, 2007

On March 27, 2007, Tokyo Sea Life Park's aquarists caught again a male goblin shark (Mitsukurina owstoni), 1.2m long at 250m deep in outer Tokyo Bay. This is the third time we caught goblin sharks since the opening of the aquarium in 1989, and the second time just in 2007.

The first time we kept one for 5 days (from April 13 to 17, 1995), and the second time for 3 days (January 25 to 27), but this time the individual has been alive for 10 days as of April 5, 2007.

Now we keep the male alive in our "compression tank," which is set up behind-the-scene. The tank, which was made in March 1997 by Tokyo Sea Life Park in order to conduct research of deep sea life, holds 3 tons of water and can produce about 10 atmospheres, equivalent of the pressure at 90 meters deep.

(April 10, 2007: Unfortunately the goblin shark died on April 10, 2007. He lived for 14 days at Tokyo Sea Life Park.)
Click to expand...

This is a list of goblin shark specimens Goblin Sharks, Mitsukurina owstoni Jordan 1898
 
That's really cool! I've only ever seen pictures of those that have been accidentally caught in fishing lines- thanks Chlidonias!
 
Since then many more have been captured (the goblin shark specimen page is outdated) and another also kept shortly in Japanse aquarium but it died as fast as earlier aquarium goblin sharks:

so-net.ne.jp
 
i am realy interested into sharks, and i do like goblin sharks.

Their spike on top of their head increase with age, aggression etc...

and probally they couldn't handle the light? pressure? etc... coz i have heard stories of deep sea animals dieing on the way up to the surface coz they have cramps and cant swim ;o
 
Awesome article, and a very interesting video. Definately the best one I've seen of the goblin shark - a real shame it did not survive.

As I understand it, the common reason for deepsea animals dying on the way to the surface is the speed of ascent. Like divers, fish have oxygen in their body, that will expand the closer to the surface it comes, and if done too quickly, the body has no time to adjust, and end up simply bursting.

Also, I imagine that the only reason the shark lived as long as 2 days in these conditions would be the unusual amount of oxygen it was enjoying, since the water it usually inhabits contains less of it than the water at the surface..

Someone with more knowledge and some actual experience on the matter could probably confirm or deny the above, since the extent of my experience is pretty much the discovery channel :rolleyes:
 
@Aram: Roughly right but there are more gasses involved than O2 like N and CO2. The most common problems are with swim bladder and eyes because they are both closed systems (connected with blood but change in pressure slow because mainly via osmotic pressure). With damage to either you usually can do nothing and the fish will die soon because it has internal bleedings or is unable to swim normally. Sometimes when you pull deep water fish up very fast it can even result in the stomach being pressed out the mouth. But with marine fish there are many things we don't know and it is hard to say what would be needed to keep them alive. Even widespread sharks from shallow depths that we know most about like thresher shark, mako shark, blue shark and porbeagle shark still haven't been kept well in aquariums. If all problems with deep water were solved it is still possible the aquarium goblin shark would not do well.
 
reading my old post i see I perhaps have to specify because it could be mistaken when I was speaking generally about deep water fish and about sharks specifically. Swim bladder is for most normal fish. For sharks that work is done by a liver with oil. No swim bladder but problem basically the same just with other organs.
 
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