The greeneye spurdog (''Squalus chloroculus'') is a species of dogfish described in 2007. It is a member of the family

Squalidae Squalidae, more commonly known as dogfish, dog sharks, or spiny dogfish, are one of several families of sharks categorized under Squaliformes, making it the second largest order of sharks, numbering 119 species across 7 families. Having earned t ...

, found off the coast of southeastern

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

. The length of the longest specimen measured is . It was considered conspecific with the

shortspine spurdog The shortspine spurdog (''Squalus mitsukurii'') is a dogfish, a member of the family Squalidae, found on continental shelves off Japan in temperate In geography, the temperate climates of Earth occur in the middle latitudes (23.5° to ...

Taxonomy

The widely-distributed

(''Squalus mitsukurii'') was found to comprise a number of distinct species; populations from southern Australian waters were described as ''Squalus chloroculus'' in 2007, the holotype collected off Portland, Victoria in 1998. The species name is derived from the Ancient Greek ''chloros'' "green" and Latin ''oculus'' "eye".Last, P.R., White, W.T. and Motomura, H. 2007. Description of Squalus chloroculus sp. nov., a new spurdog from southern Australia, and the resurrection of S. montalbani Whitley. In: P.R Last, W.T. White and J.J. Pogonoski (eds) (eds), Descriptions of New Dogfishes of the genus Squalus (Squaloidea: Squalidae), pp: 55‒69.. CSIRO,, Australia.

Description

The greeneye spurdog is a robust dogfish with a fusiform body shape, bright green eyes, and overall grey colour. The underparts are paler: paler grey chin and throat to grey-white along the body and tail. The dorsal fins are pale grey with black margins. The pectoral and pelvic fins are grey with paler trailing edges and undersurfaces. The caudal fin is mostly grey with a dark patch over the notch.

Distribution and habitat

The species lives in waters off southern and eastern Australia from Eucla in Western Australia to Jervis Bay in New South Wales, on the upper and middle continental slope from depths of . The greeneye spurdog is one of four species identified as threatened with extinction by trawling in a 2021 report. The species is caught up in demersal trawling and automatic longline fishing on the upper continental slope by the Southern and Eastern Scalefish and Shark fishery and the Great Australian Bight Trawl Fishery.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q5033788

greeneye spurdog The greeneye spurdog (''Squalus chloroculus'') is a species of dogfish described in 2007. It is a member of the family Squalidae, found off the coast of southeastern Australia. The length of the longest specimen measured is . It was considered c ...

Marine fish of Southern Australia Marine fish of Tasmania