Holohalaelurus regani (Izak catshark or Halalujah shark)

(Gilchrist, 1922)

Life > Eukaryotes > Opisthokonta > Metazoa (animals) > Bilateria > Deuterostomia > Chordata > Craniata > Vertebrata (vertebrates)  > Gnathostomata (jawed vertebrates) >.Chondrichthyes > Elasmobranchii > Galeomorphii > Carcharhiniformes > Scyliorhinidae

Holohalaelurus regani (Izak catshark or Halalujah shark) [Illustration by Ann Hecht ©]

Identification

A broad-headed catshark with crowded dark brown spots on a yellowish background, producing a netlike pattern of light lines, small black pores on the white underside, and no labial furrows. Young below 23 cm TL are blackish with white side spots.

Size

To 66 cm TL.

Range

Almost entire coast from central Namibia to southern Mozambique; this or related species north to Kenya and Somalia.

Habitat

Offshore in 160 to 740 m depth.

Biology

Lays one egg per oviduct. Eats pelagic bony fish, including lightfish, lanternfish, anchovies, sardines, and maasbanker, and fish offal, hagfish eggs, crabs, amphipods, mantis shrimp, slipper lobsters, hermit crabs, squid, octopi, and cuttlefish. Its stomach usually retains a volume of liquid digested matter, often laced with numerous cephalopod beaks and tinsel-like scales of lightfish and lanternfish, and is usually bloated like a balloon.

Human Impact

Frequently taken by bottom trawlers.

Text by Leonard J.V. Compagno, David A. Ebert and Malcolm J. Smale