25 Coolest Shark Facts
THE 25 COOLEST FACTS WE KNOW ABOUT SHARKS
1. Sharks have existed almost unchanged for 400 million years - long before the dinosaur came into existence.
2. It's impossible to sneak up on a shark. Because their eyes are on the sides of their heads, most can see almost as well behind them as they can in front. But they do have two blind spots: one in the front of their snout and one directly behind their head.
3. Much like a tree, you can tell how old a shark is by counting the rings on its vertebrae.
4. A great white shark can lose 1,000 teeth in a year. It takes most humans seven years to lose their 20 baby teeth.
5. A shark may lose and grow up to 30,000 teeth in its lifetime - hardly an issue when it can take as few as three days to grow a replacement.
6. Developing pups of the sand tiger shark would give Hannibal Lecter a run for his money. They practice intrauterine cannibalism: as they grow they begin to eat their brothers and sisters until eventually only two sharks are born - one from each of the mother's two uteruses.
7. A shark can detect the electrical impulse emitted by a standard AA battery one mile away.
8. Two-thirds of a shark's brain is dedicated to its sense of smell.
9. A lemon shark can smell one drop of blood in an Olympic size swimming pool.
10. Further proving sharks are the ultimate hunters, they can detect whether a scent is coming from their right or left nostril to better help them track down their prey.
11. Cookie cutter sharks may be small but they're gutsy. They use their saw-like jaws to feed on pieces of whale blubber - from LIVING whales.
12. Both the largest and the second largest sharks in the world, the whale shark and the basking shark, are harmless plankton eaters.
13. The world's smallest shark, the pygmy shark, is just six inches long when fully grown. The bull shark can live in fresh water OR salt water and has been known to travel as far north as Indiana v
ia the Ohio River and Red Wing, Minnesota via the Mississippi River.
15. Sharks will sink if they stop swimming.
16. Sharks have no bones. Their skeletons are made up entirely of cartilage. When a shark dies, salt from the ocean water completely dissolves its skeleton, leaving only the shark's teeth behind.
17. A large great white shark can go a full three months between meals.
18. There are no vegetarian sharks.
19. When hatched, zebra sharks are dark black with white vertical stripes (hence, the name). But as they age, they turn yellow with dark black spots, resembling a leopard!
20. The world's fastest shark, the salmon shark, can swim up to 55 miles per hour. Olympian Michael Phelps can swim 5 miles per hour.
21. The shortfin mako shark can accelerate faster than a Porsche.
22. Juvenile hammerheads have been known to "suntan" in shallow waters before moving into deeper waters to improve their counter shading.
23. Tiger shark teeth are strong and sharp enough to tear through the shells of sea turtles.
24. The longest migration documented in sharks is a great white that traveled 12,400 miles from South Africa to Australia and back - in less than nine months.
25. You are more likely to be killed by a falling coconut than by a shark.