Leopard shark  (Stegostoma fasciatum)

These sharks are mostly solitary (6) but can occasionally be found in aggregations of 20 to 50 individuals (1). Believed to be a nocturnal hunter, they spend most of the day lazily swimming and resting on the bottom (5), becoming active at night when they hunt for sleeping fish, molluscs and crustaceans (3). A slow but powerful swimmer, leopard sharks have unusually flexible bodies that are used to squirm into tiny crevices in search of food (5) (6).

Female leopard sharks lay large, purplish-black eggs, which they anchor to the floor with many long hair-like fibres (7). It is likely that more than one egg is laid at a time. Once hatched, the young are independent of their mother (6). Males reach sexual maturity once they reach a size of between 1.5 and 1.8 metres and females at around 1.7 metres (8). The life-span of leopard sharks in the wild is not exactly known, but it is thought that they may live for an average of 25 years (6).