leopard shark

lowrider19

lowrider19

Member
Hey I have a leopard shard and I have had him for a couple months now. I never see him eat or anything and he is only active at night when everything is dark. I thought these were suppose to be active sharks. am I misunderstood?:help:
 
lowrider19

lowrider19

Member
He is currently in a 125 right now I am gonna get a bigger tank soon but he is little so I figured he is ok. He has been like this since day one
 
mattiej

mattiej

Member
What size is the shark? If it's under about 8 inches then the pup was probably ripped out of a pregnant female and might not make it. This is just one opinion. Other things to look at would be if there is any electrical currents in the tank (can solve with grounding probe), was the tank ever treated with any medications (most are extremely harmful to sharks), or are the water parameters OK. Any one of the above could be an issue. Collection stress can cause long term problems that sharks can not get over. I'm sorry if I'm not of more help but if you could post the water parameters and some more info and I'll see if I can help you. Just to let you know I was a Biologist at the New Jersey State Aquarium for some time and was one of the people that cared for the sharks in the ocean tank, so I have some experience.
 
lowrider19

lowrider19

Member
the shark is about 14 inches. my high range ph is at 8.0,My ammonia is 0, Nitrite 0 but my nitrates are high at like 160
 
cbshark

cbshark

Member
Please post a picture of your shark. I don't know anything about your experience or knowledge of sharks, but is it possible that you were sold a banded cat shark that was passed off as a leopard? Leopards are seldomly inactive and the fact that it is and only moves around at night makes me wonder if you were duped into buying a mistakenly identified leopard shark. i had two banded cats and they behaved exactly how you described yours.
 
gasguzzler

gasguzzler

Active Member
Nitrates in a reef tank that high would be bad, but sharks are resiliant and some can handle it in the thousands.
 
pufferman

pufferman

Member
to me your leopard looks more like a cat shark....but i'm not sure....true leopards never stop swimming.....so if your shark is just sitting around....then probably it is not leopard shark.....but again not so sure......if you have a real leopard shark.....i mean triakis semifasciata........you're going to need not just bigger tank...but really really big tank......i would say 500 gallon minimum.....but hopefully bigger than 1000 gallon in the long run.......also they're temperate species...not tropical...so you might have to choose tankmates accordingly.
 
gasguzzler

gasguzzler

Active Member
Agreed, if you got that shark sold to you as a leopard, you got hosed. How much did you pay, if Im not being nosey?
 
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