Indeed, we do have sharks in Sweden. Perhaps up to 17 different species!
Some are, of course, very rare visitors to Swedish waters, while others live their entire lives in the same place. You can find them on the west coast, but occasionally, a few can make their way into the Baltic Sea.
The basking shark, the world’s second-largest fish, can grow over 10 meters long and has been spotted off Möja in the Stockholm archipelago. But most of them are small. The spiny dogfish is probably the most common, followed by the small-spotted catshark. The latter doesn’t grow more than a meter long in our waters.
At Havets Hus in Lysekil, they breed small-spotted catsharks in aquariums and release them into the Gullmarsfjorden. However, they haven’t been keeping track of where they lay their eggs. Not until now. In June, a diving team from Deep Sea was out filming spiny sharks when they encountered something very unusual and interesting…
Basking Shark (Cetorhinus maximus)
Common Thresher (Alopias vulpinus)
Spiny Dogfish (Squalus acanthias)
School Shark (Galeorhinus galeus)
Small-spotted Catshark (Scyliorhinus canicula)
Large-spotted Dogfish (Scyliorhinus stellaris)
Sleeper Shark (Somniosus microcephalus)
Bluntnose Sixgill Shark (Hexanchus griseus)
Velvet Belly Lanternshark (Etmopterus spinax)
Angular Roughshark (Oxynotus centrina)
Angelshark (Squatina squatina)