Lilly the amazing mako shark

‘Lilly’ the shortfin mako is an ‘oceanic’ shark, which means she lives in the open ocean. Makos are found world-wide in temperate and tropical seas including those off Australia. They are beautiful sharks with a long conical snout, large black eyes and metallic indigo blue colour on the back fading down the sides to a white belly. Makos like traveling and appear to prefer warm waters. Makos like Lilly are among the fastest fish and unlike many other sharks they can generate body heat that provides the energy to swim at radical speeds.

Because makos like Lilly are fantastic swimmers, they can make spectacular leaps of up to 6 metres into the air. Medium sized makos eat as much as 5-6 kilos of fish and squid in a day and larger animals probably consume a lot more. They are very good at hunting and have been known to bite the tails off hooked marlin, swordfish and tuna. Lilly has long, thin, sharp teeth that help her to catch these slippery fish. Like other sharks, when Lilly’s teeth are lost, broken, or worn down, they are replaced by new ones.

Lilly is about 2 m long now but she might grow up to about 3.5 m long, and weigh up to 450 kg. Mako sharks grow and mature slowly, and have relatively few young each year. Therefore, the loss of individuals may have large impacts on populations. Some fishers don’t like to kill these sharks as they respect and fear them for being such an amazing hunter. Instead, they prefer to tag them and let them go so they can be identified the next time they are caught. Mako sharks are considered dangerous but there are very few confirmed attacks on swimmers. People make regular dive trips to photograph them in the deep oceanic waters off Africa (http://www.apexpredators.com/sharkmako.asp)