Slender Smooth-hound

About the Slender Smooth-hound

The slender smooth-hound is a species of ground shark endemic to New Zealand. It’s usually found near the bottom, at depths between 300 and 600 m/984.3 to 1,968.5 ft. As their common name indicates, slender smoothhounds are long and slim, and can reach lengths of over 1.1m/3 ft 7.3 in. They’re usually brown or brownish grey. They have a rudimentary nictitating membrane and about 100 rows of small teeth in both the upper and lower jaw.

 

Due to their demersal lifestyle, the majority of their prey are crustaceans and fish from the bottom of the ocean. They’re ovoviviparous, meaning an animal produces eggs that hatch inside the mother’s body before birth, and embryos survive at first by eating unfertlized eggs, and later are fed via yolk sac, and in some cases by a uterine milk, a nutritious substance produced by the mother. Litter sizes are commonly just 2, one pup per uterus.

 

Slender smooth-hounds are currently considered a species of least concern by the IUCN. They’re not economically significant and are not targeted, but they’re sometimes caught as bycatch. Due to their low fecundity, this species could become threatened if trawling activity increases in the region.

The Slender Smoothhound is taken incidentally in deepwater benthic trawl and longline fisheries (Francis 2015), however, in general it is likely to have limited overlap with fishing due to the seasonal nature of fisheries in some areas where it occurs (Ford et al. 2015). In a qualitative risk assessment for New Zealand’s chondrichthyans, this species was ranked at low-moderate risk from commercial fishing (Ford et al. 2015). 

New Zealand has had a Quota Management System (QMS) in place since 1986 to provide for the sustainable management of its fisheries. The Slender Smoothhound is a non-QMS species, meaning that there is no species-specific management in place for the species (MPI 2013). New Zealand has a system of Benthic Protected Areas (BPAs) and Seamount Closures, which would likely provide some refuge for this species around the Kermadec Ridge and possibly elsewhere. The Slender Smoothhound has also been recorded from the Kermadec Islands Marine Reserve, where fishing and mining is prohibited (Duffy and Francis 2010). Further information is required on life history, population, and fisheries interactions of the Slender Smoothhound.

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