Needle dogfish

Needle dogfish
Conservation status
Near Threatened (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Chondrichthyes
Subclass:	Elasmobranchii
Order:	Squaliformes
Family:	Centrophoridae
Genus:	Centrophorus
Species:	C. acus
Binomial name
Centrophorus acus (Garman, 1906)
Range of needle dogfish (in blue)

The needle dogfish, Centrophorus acus, is a small, little-known deepwater shark. It is found in the northern Gulf of Mexico and the western Pacific Ocean around Honshū, Japan. It has no anal fin, two dorsal fins with spines, the first dorsal fin being low and long, a moderately long snout, and a notched caudal fin. Length at least 81 cm. Almost nothing else is known about this shark other than that it lives below 200 meters.

References

• Horodysky & Burgess (2005). Centrophorus acus. 2006. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. www.iucnredlist.org. Retrieved on 11 May 2006. Database entry includes justification for why this species is near threatened
• "Centrophorus acus". Integrated Taxonomic Information System. http://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=160642. Retrieved 5 February 2006. 
• FAO Species Catalogue Volume 4 Parts 1 and 2 Sharks of the World
• Froese, Rainer, and Daniel Pauly, eds. (2006). "Centrophorus acus" in FishBase. February 2006 version.

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