A guide to sharks and skates in Danish and adjacent waters

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Abstract

Sharks, skates and rays (also known as elasmobranchs) are typically long-lived fishes with late maturation and low fecundity. These life-history characteristics make them particularly susceptible to anthropogenic stressors such as fishing pressure, habitat degradation and climate changes. Reporting fishery-dependent and -independent catches of elasmobranchs on species level are a prerequisite for the assessment and monitoring of elasmobranch stocks and, thus, contributing to their sustainable exploitation and conservation.

A guide to sharks and skates in Danish and adjacent waters aims to assist employees at DTU Aqua, field observers, fishers and other users in the field with improved species identification of elasmobranchs. The idea is that the user can print, laminate and assemble the guide with a spiral binding or key rings.

All the material used in the guide is based on the Fish Atlas from Copenhagen University (Fiskeatlas), data from DTU Aqua surveys and landing sites (Rindorf et al., 2023), scientific surveys from northern and western Europe (Datras, 2024), guides by Ebert & Dando (2020), Ebert, Dando and Fowler (2021) and Last et al. (2016) as well as websites and databases, including sharktrust.org, iucnredlist.org and shark-references.com.

The guide includes a total of 14 species of sharks and 16 species of skates in Danish and adjacent waters, some of which are more common than others. In the Fish Atlas, some species of rays documented in Denmark are the marbled electric ray (Torpedo marmorata), common stingray (Dasyatis pastinaca), Atlantic torpedo (Tetronarce nobiliana), common eagle ray (Myliobatis aquila) as well as the angelshark (Squatina squatina) but these are not included in this guide, since they are so rare, hence, catches are very unlikely.

For further information, read more about the individual species on www.fiskeatlas.ku.dk or generally about their conservation status on www.iucnredlist.org. All the sources used are referenced in the list of references at the back of the guide.
Original languageEnglish
Place of PublicationKgs. Lyngby, Denmark
PublisherDTU Aqua
Number of pages90
ISBN (Electronic)978-87-7481-414-6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2025
SeriesDTU Aqua-rapport
Number475-2025
ISSN1395-8216

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