Researchers at Queensland’s James Cook University have had their most successful year breeding epaulette sharks. Also known as walking sharks they can survive on little to no oxygen now their resilience is being tested to check the health of the Great Barrier Reef.
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00:00Spotty and shimmering, in this lab researchers are breeding epaulette sharks.
00:07We'll palpate the females, we just sort of feel her abdomen to see if we can feel if she's got eggs.
00:14Known as a walking shark, it moves on its fins, surviving with little to no oxygen.
00:20It doesn't look really tough in terms of a shark face, and it's not very bitey, but it's really tough in terms of what it can tolerate.
00:28Making it an ideal species to study.
00:31So I'm currently working with what would be considered an early juvenile stage, so about two to three months old.
00:37Eggs have been incubated at different temperatures and exposed to varying acid levels.
00:42The juveniles are also tested in how they adapt.
00:46As babies we know that they're a lot more sensitive to elevated temperatures.
00:50That could compromise growth, it could compromise their metabolism, and it could compromise their survival.
00:55The epaulette shark can be found along the entire length of the Great Barrier Reef.
01:00But with little movement between colonies, the species has genetic diversity.
01:05Ideal for studying the effects of climate change.
01:08That way we can really tease apart all of these different traits that are necessary to cope with these challenging stressors.
01:15Scientists hope the shark inspires reef conservation efforts.
01:19We just need to find that one thing that people can latch onto to care about, because it's so, so, so worth it. So worth it.
01:25When we introduce the community, the general public, the kids at school to the epaulette shark, everyone falls in love.