AY Honors/Species Account/Negaprion brevirostris

The lemon shark (Negaprion brevirostris) is a well studied shark belonging to the family Carcharhinidae. It is found mainly along the subtropical and tropical part of the Atlantic coast of N and S America. The species is the best known of all sharks in terms of behaviour and ecology, mainly thanks to the enormous effort of Dr Sonny Gruber at University of Miami who has been studying lemon shark both in the field and in the laboratory for the past 40 years. The population around Bimini Islands in the western Bahamas, where Dr Gruber's field station Bimini Biological Field Station is situated, is probably the best known of all shark populations.

Female lemon sharks give birth to 4-17 young every other year in warm and shallow lagoons. The young have to defend for themselves and remain in shallow water near mangroves until they grow bigger. With increasing size, the sharks venture further away from their birth place. At maturity at a size of 1.5-2 m and an age of 12-15 years, they leave the shallow water and move into deeper waters more offshore. However, little is known from this life stage. Recent genetical work by Drs Kevin Feldheim, Sonny Gruber and Mary Ashley may suggest that adult sharks move over hundreds of km to mate, or populations far apart may have been separated in recent time. Further research in this area would be of immense importance for the understanding of the lemon shark's breeding behaviour and ecology.