Diet of Pacific sleeper shark, Somniosus pacificus, in the the Gulf of Alaska

• Main Authors: Yang, Mei-Sun, Page, Benjamin N.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: NOAA 1999
• Subjects: Bering Sea; Gulf of Alaska; Pacific; harbor seal; Phoca vitulina; Southern Right Whale; Alaska
• Online Access: https://oceanrep.geomar.de/id/eprint/52941/; https://oceanrep.geomar.de/id/eprint/52941/1/3706.pdf

The sleeper shark, Somniosus pacificus, ranges from Chile (Crovetto et al., 1992) through southern California (Phillips,1953), British Columbia to the Gulf of Alaska (Bright,1959), the Bering Sea (Wilimovsky,1954), and Japan (Tanaka et al.,1982). It is thought to be a voracious and versatile feeder and its diet has been shown to include young marine mammals, such as harbor seal, Phoca vitulina (Bright,1959), and the southern right whale dolphin, Lissodelphis peronii, (Crovetto et al.,1992). The purpose of this study is to describe the diet of the sleeper shark in the Gulf of Alaska area.