- New forms of marine life are usually tracked down in
the rarefied waters of the Great Barrier Reef or Red Sea. A new species
of "furry" shark, however, which hops like a frog rather than
swims, has been discovered in the unprepossessing habitat of a German aquarium.
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- The 70cm (28in) female shark, nicknamed Cuddles, is covered
in hairy bristles, has big nostrils and an extra gill that set her apart
from the 405 known shark species.
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- According to the dozens of marine biologists who have
flocked to inspect Cuddles, her fins are smaller but more muscular than
those found on similar-sized sharks. She claps them together in order to
hop across the bottom of her tank, in the Sea Star aquarium in Coburg.
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- "She leaps over the seabed like a frog rather than
swimming gracefully like most sharks," said Peter Faltermeer, a marine
biologist and the aquarium's curator.
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- The scientists, he said, were confounded. "They
were all left totally baffled and we were left delighted," Mr Faltermeer
said. "They couldn't classify her. Cuddles is unique and she belongs
to us."
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- The shark's former home, an Austrian zoo, gave her to
the aquarium, not realising her rarity. The Sea Star is now in the process
of choosing a Latin and English name for the new species.
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- "This is the first time a totally new species of
shark has been found not in the wild but in a fish tank," he said.
"It is amazing."
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- He believes that because Cuddles does not have sensory
organs at the front of the head, as do other sharks, she uses the bristles
that cover her from head to tail to provide an early warning of possible
predators, or prey.
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- "She lets algae grow without trying to rub it off,
which is gradually turning the bristles bright red," said Mr Faltermeer.
"We believe the bristles pick up movements in the water, and the algae
helps to thicken the bristles and lengthen them."
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- Unlike other sharks, the iris of Cuddles's eyes is fixed
open. She also has abnormally wide nostrils and a fifth gill that is designed
to filter plankton. "Other sharks filter plankton, but these don't
also chase fish," he said. "But Cuddles has a full set of teeth
and the main ones are extraordinarily long.
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- "She seems to eat anything. We've tried squid, red
bass, krill and trout, and she eats it all. She also has an enormously
strong bite for her size. She can bite through things other sharks would
have problems with."
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- He believes that the shark has adapted to living and
hunting in the dark - probably in a cave rather than in deep water. Most
of the biologists believe that Cuddles came from somewhere around southern
Africa.
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- "The eyes that are not designed to cope with light,
the all-body hair, the wide nostrils and the way she uses her fins more
like legs all indicate she is used to a dark cave environment.
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- "Caves often have rich sources of plankton, which
might suggest why her body has undergone such adaptations."
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- The aquarium would like to find Cuddles a mate as she
is believed to be fully grown, but must first narrow down where she came
from in order to search for a similar match.
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- So far she has proved less than maternal: when nurse
sharks who share her tank laid eggs, Cuddles ate them.
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- While the shark is now a popular sight at the Sea Star
aquarium, it has taken many years for her to be fully appreciated. Asked
how it had managed to give away such a rarity as a hairy hopping shark
that dyes its hair red, the Schonbrunn Zoo in Vienna denied making a mistake.
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- "We are not embarrassed," said the zoo's spokesman
Dr Ekkehard Wolf. "We get thousands of exotic animals every year.
It is not possible to categorise them all."
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- He admitted, however, that they had kept Cuddles in a
tank for two years without putting her on public display. They had been
relieved when the Sea Star offered to take her away.
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- Before the zoo took her in, Cuddles had been held at
an animal rescue centre. It took her in after the centre in which she'd
been on display shut after it was flooded.
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- The owner of the centre apparently bought the shark from
a pet shop, whose owner said he couldn't remember where a single baby shark
had come from four years earlier.
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- Mr Faltermeer said: "The Austrian zoo experts should
not feel too bad. Where they kept her, you could only see her from above.
To be honest, when I first saw her when she was delivered I thought she
was an ordinary nurse shark.
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- "It was only when we got her in the aquarium and
saw her from the side that we realised she was special."
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- © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2004.
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