The boa catshark (''Scyliorhinus boa'') is a catshark of the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Scyliorhinidae Scyliorhinidae is a Family (biology), family of sharks, one of a few families whose members share the common name catsharks, belonging to the Order (biology), order Carcharhiniformes, the ground sharks. Although they are generally known as cats ...

. It is found on the

continental shelves A continental shelf is a portion of a continent that is submerged under an area of relatively shallow water, known as a shelf sea. Much of these shelves were exposed by drops in sea level during glacial periods. The shelf surrounding an island ...

and insular slopes of the

Caribbean Sea The Caribbean Sea is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere, located south of the Gulf of Mexico and southwest of the Sargasso Sea. It is bounded by the Greater Antilles to the north from Cuba ...

and the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico () is an oceanic basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, mostly surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southw ...

, between

latitude In geography, latitude is a geographic coordinate system, geographic coordinate that specifies the north-south position of a point on the surface of the Earth or another celestial body. Latitude is given as an angle that ranges from −90° at t ...

s 20° N and 9° N, at depths between 330 and 675 m. It can grow up to a length of 54 cm. The reproduction of this catshark is

oviparous Oviparous animals are animals that reproduce by depositing fertilized zygotes outside the body (i.e., by laying or spawning) in metabolically independent incubation organs known as eggs, which nurture the embryo into moving offsprings kno ...

Description

The boa catshark is a fairly small, slender but deep-bodied species that can grow to a length of about . The front nasal flaps do not extend as far as the mouth, which has grooves on the lower lip only, and there are no nasoral grooves. The first dorsal fin has its origin just behind the rear end of the pelvic fin; there is a wide gap between it and the second dorsal fin, which is much smaller and has its origin above the posterior part of the pelvic fin. The skin is only slightly rough and the placoid scales are small. The background colour of the dorsal surface and flanks is pale yellowish-brown. The markings consist of a number of rather indistinct rectangular grey patches and saddles which are outlined with small black spots. Other black spots sometimes form net-like rows but these are seldom superimposed on the grey patches. There is sometimes a scattering of white spots also.

Distribution

The boa catshark is native to the tropical western Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea; it is found near the seabed on the continental shelves and insular slopes of the region between about 20°N and 9°N. It is a deepwater species, occurring at depths between about .

Ecology

This catshark has been little studied. It is

, laying a pair of eggs, with the embryos feeding on the yolk as they develop.

Status

As a deepwater species, the boa catshark lives below the depths at which commercial trawling takes place in the Caribbean region. The fish does not seem to face any particular threats and the

International Union for Conservation of Nature The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the stat ...

has assessed its conservation status as being of "

least concern A least-concern species is a species that has been evaluated and categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as not being a focus of wildlife conservation because the specific species is still plentiful in the wil ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2625931 boa catshark Fish of the Caribbean Fish of the Dominican Republic Least concern biota of North America Taxa named by George Brown Goode Taxa named by Tarleton Hoffman Bean boa catshark