Carcharhinidae

Requiem sharks are members in the family Carcharhinidae. They are migratory, live-bearing sharks of warm seas and include such species as the blacktip shark, bull shark, lemon shark, nervous shark, and whitetip reef shark.

Carcharhinidae

Brian Gratwicke · CC BY 2.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
requiem sharkPBDB
Sits inside
CarcharhiniformesPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Carcharhiniformes
Life habit
nektonicPBDB, for Carcharhiniformes
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Carcharhiniformes

Time the record covers

At least 132 million years on record.

The record covers at least 132.6 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 137.05 Mya to 0 Mya.

Early Cretaceous — about 1 of 2009 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 2 of 2009 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 36 of 2009 occurrencesEocene — about 766 of 2009 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 113 of 2009 occurrencesMiocene — about 833 of 2009 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 154 of 2009 occurrencesPleistocene — about 90 of 2009 occurrences140–135 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences135–130 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences75–70 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences70–65 Mya — about 3 occurrences65–61 Mya — about 9 occurrences61–56 Mya — about 27 occurrences56–51 Mya — about 79 occurrences51–47 Mya — about 103 occurrences47–42 Mya — about 155 occurrences42–37 Mya — about 189 occurrences37–33 Mya — about 252 occurrences33–28 Mya — about 54 occurrences28–23 Mya — about 43 occurrences23–19 Mya — about 137 occurrences19–14 Mya — about 213 occurrences14–9.3 Mya — about 280 occurrences9.3–4.7 Mya — about 251 occurrences4.7–0 Mya — about 211 occurrences132.6 Mya11.7 ka140 Mya0 Mya

2,009 occurrences of Carcharhinidae on record, most of them in the Miocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

2,009 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

299 formations

Gehannam — 29.31°N, 30.18°EGehannam — 29.36°N, 30.16°EGehannam — 29.33°N, 30.08°EGehannam — 29.30°N, 30.05°EBirket Qarun — 29.27°N, 30.06°EBirket Qarun — 29.27°N, 30.01°EBirket Qarun — 29.50°N, 30.56°EBirket Qarun — 29.45°N, 30.36°EChucunaque — 9.13°N, 78.75°WChucunaque — 9.15°N, 78.79°WPirabas — 1.21°S, 47.16°WPirabas — 0.48°S, 48.17°WPirabas — 1.05°S, 47.16°WPirabas — 0.60°S, 47.31°WPirabas — 0.73°S, 47.49°WPirabas — 0.63°S, 47.54°WTallahatta — 31.31°N, 88.73°WTallahatta — 31.57°N, 88.34°WTallahatta — 31.79°N, 88.32°WTallahatta — 31.39°N, 88.69°WTallahatta — 31.30°N, 86.48°WTallahatta — 31.37°N, 86.52°WUrumaco — 11.25°N, 70.28°WUrumaco — 11.24°N, 70.25°WGosport Sand — 31.54°N, 87.52°WGosport Sand — 31.53°N, 87.57°WGosport Sand — 31.50°N, 87.80°WGosport Sand — 31.50°N, 88.50°WGosport Sand — 31.59°N, 88.02°WLagos-Portimão — 37.08°N, 8.28°WLagos-Portimão — 37.12°N, 8.54°WLagos-Portimão — 37.08°N, 8.67°WGatun — 9.35°N, 79.80°WGatun — 9.35°N, 79.84°WGatun — 9.34°N, 79.88°WQasr el-Sagha — 29.60°N, 30.67°EQasr el-Sagha — 29.32°N, 30.05°EQasr el-Sagha — 29.27°N, 30.01°ECantaure — 11.97°N, 70.02°WCantaure — 11.94°N, 70.02°WCalvert — 38.54°N, 76.73°WCalvert — 37.93°N, 77.51°WCalvert — 38.60°N, 76.51°WCalvert — 38.67°N, 76.53°WCalvert — 38.38°N, 76.99°WCalvert — 38.40°N, 76.50°WCalvert — 38.17°N, 76.81°WCalvert — 39.20°N, 75.60°WPisco — 14.56°S, 75.67°WPisco — 15.44°S, 74.87°WPisco — 15.56°S, 74.69°WPisco — 14.34°S, 75.91°WLisbon — 31.36°N, 86.52°WLisbon — 31.83°N, 88.31°WLisbon — 31.75°N, 88.10°WMidawara — 29.03°N, 30.13°EMidawara — 29.08°N, 30.10°EMidawara — 28.64°N, 30.88°ESelsey — 50.80°N, 1.21°WSeria — 4.81°N, 114.67°EDongen — 52.73°N, 6.30°EDongen — 53.16°N, 6.22°EStatenville — 30.40°N, 83.00°WStatenville — 30.23°N, 82.63°WDry Branch — 33.62°N, 81.68°WDry Branch — 33.50°N, 84.74°WDry Branch — 33.12°N, 81.70°WDry Branch — 33.58°N, 81.43°WBerchem — 51.20°N, 4.44°EArenas de Huelva — 37.35°N, 6.61°WArenas de Huelva — 37.33°N, 6.68°WArenas de Huelva — 37.27°N, 6.84°WArenas de Huelva — 37.22°N, 7.10°WYazoo — 31.66°N, 92.90°WYazoo — 31.82°N, 92.33°WYazoo — 31.71°N, 87.96°WYazoo — 31.93°N, 88.46°WYazoo — 31.93°N, 91.94°WYazoo — 31.69°N, 88.30°WAlachua — 29.55°N, 82.52°WAlachua — 29.65°N, 82.60°W

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Carcharhinidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 275 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 371 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Carcharhinidae and its relatives

Miocene

Where Carcharhinidae and its relatives were recorded in the Miocene.

Found in the same rock

4,147 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 748 sites for Carcharhinidae, and this reads 240 of them. Of that, one read hit the database's own return limit, so every count below is a floor rather than a total. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

396 references

Each of the 2,009 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 384 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Carcharhinidae

Credit
Brian Gratwicke
Licence
CC BY 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itCarcharhiniformes through timeFormations of the MioceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Jordan and Evermann 1896)