Blue shark

Fish · Last reviewed 2026-08-17

The oceanic shark that comes within reach of a British day boat every summer — slender, indigo, curious, and the reason shark fishing exists as a UK charter fishery at all.

Safety

Species that bite — Can cause injury needing treatment

A blue shark has serrated, curved cutting teeth and comes alongside a boat with people leaning over the gunwale. Hands near the mouth during unhooking, or a shark that rolls while the trace is held, can produce a severe laceration. The animals are also unusually inquisitive and will come very close, which lowers people's guard.

What reduces it: Unhook in the water with a long T-bar or long-nosed pliers, never fingers. One person on the trace, wearing heavy gloves, with everybody else clear. Cut the trace rather than persist with a hook that cannot be reached. Never bring a shark aboard a small boat to remove a hook.

Worse when:

A fish brought over the side rather than unhooked alongside
Several people crowding the same shark for photographs
A tired angler at the end of a long fight making a quick decision

Injury while handling fish — Can cause injury needing treatment

Shark skin is covered in dermal denticles and behaves like coarse abrasive. A forearm dragged along a rolling shark loses skin, and the same surface will part a leader that no tooth has touched.

What reduces it: Gloves, a long rubbing leader above the bite trace, and never letting a fish roll inside the line. Support a shark's body rather than gripping it.

Worse when:

Wet skin and bare forearms
A long fight in which the fish rolls repeatedly

Fish welfare — Can cause injury needing treatment

A shark lifted from the water unsupported is injured by its own weight — the body is supported by cartilage and by water, and neither works on a deck. Long fights, gut-hooking and air exposure all reduce the chance a released fish survives, and the fish being released are mostly immature females.

What reduces it: Circle hooks, a fight short enough that the animal is not exhausted, unhooking in the water, and no lift for a photograph. Where a picture is wanted, take it with the fish in the water alongside.

Worse when:

Light tackle that cannot end a fight
Warm surface water, which lowers dissolved oxygen and raises the cost of exhaustion

Ask a British angler what shark fishing means and the answer is this fish. Blue sharks arrive in the western approaches on warm water each summer, they can be brought to a boat within a few hours of a Cornish, Welsh or Irish harbour, and a day's chumming will often produce several.

IT IS AN OCEANIC ANIMAL VISITING A SHELF SEA. Everything about a blue shark is built for crossing open water: extremely long pectoral fins, a slim body, a pointed snout, and a migratory range that takes individuals across the whole North Atlantic and back. It is not a resident, and the summer fishery is a window rather than a season.

THE COLOUR IS THE IDENTIFICATION AND IT DOES NOT SURVIVE THE FISH. Alive in clear water a blue shark is an extraordinary indigo above, shading through a sharp line to white below. Dead, that colour goes to a dull slate-grey within hours, which is why photographs of landed fish look nothing like the animal in the water and why the colour is only useful to somebody looking over the side.

AND IT IS ASSESSED AS NEAR THREATENED AND FISHED HARDER THAN ALMOST ANY OTHER SHARK ON EARTH. The blue shark is the most heavily caught shark in global fisheries, overwhelmingly as bycatch of pelagic longlining. The UK recreational fishery is a rounding error against that, which is an argument for careful release rather than an argument that release does not matter.

Identification

FishingHQ holds no photograph of this species whose identity and licensing it can vouch for, so it is not showing one. Misidentified fish photographs teach identification wrongly, and a picture with an unchecked caption would be worse than none. The identification points below are what to look at instead.

Scientific name: Prionace glauca
Family: Carcharhinidae
Water: Saltwater
Conservation status: Near Threatened
Regions: Britain & Ireland, Western Europe, Northern Europe, Mediterranean, North America, Global

PECTORAL FINS ABSURDLY LONG — roughly as long as the distance from the snout to the gill slits, and narrow. No other shark a British boat meets has them. If the fish looks like it has wings, it is a blue shark.
INDIGO ABOVE, SHARP WHITE BELOW, with a hard line between the two rather than a gradient. The blue is genuinely blue in life and fades to grey within hours of death, so it identifies a living fish and not a landed one.
A LONG, POINTED, CONICAL SNOUT that is noticeably longer than the mouth is wide. A porbeagle's snout is short and blunt by comparison.
SLENDER THROUGHOUT — a blue shark of two metres is a much lighter animal than a porbeagle of the same length, and the difference is obvious side by side.
TEETH ARE TRIANGULAR, SERRATED AND CURVED in the upper jaw, narrower in the lower. Cutting teeth, and they work on a hand exactly as they work on a mackerel.
NO KEEL ON THE TAIL STOCK. A porbeagle and a mako both have a strong lateral keel; a blue shark's caudal peduncle is plain.

Size

Typical: 1.5–2.2 m and 15–40 kg for rod-caught fish in British and Irish waters.
Large: Over 2.5 m and 55 kg is a very good blue shark anywhere in the north-east Atlantic.

Exceptional: Around 3.8 m is the widely reported maximum for the species, with the largest individuals being females. Fish approaching that size are exceptional anywhere and effectively unknown from British day-boat fishing.

Lifecycle and reproduction

Blue sharks are viviparous with a yolk-sac placenta — a genuine placental connection, unusual among sharks and shared with the other requiem sharks. Gestation runs to somewhere between nine and twelve months, and litters are large by shark standards: commonly around thirty pups and occasionally very many more. Pups are born around 40 cm and grow quickly. Maturity comes at four to six years, which is early for a shark, and individuals live around twenty years. That combination — early maturity, large litters, fast growth — makes the blue shark far more productive than a tope or a spurdog, and it is the reason the species has absorbed a fishing mortality that would have erased a slower animal. It has not absorbed it without cost.

The North Atlantic population is strongly segregated by sex and size, and it moves. Mating occurs in the western Atlantic; females then cross eastward, and the nursery grounds are largely off Iberia and in the eastern Atlantic. The consequence for British fishing is specific and worth knowing: the blue sharks caught off Cornwall and the Irish south-west in summer are overwhelmingly immature and predominantly female. They are not a local stock and they are not adults, which is why the fishery is almost entirely catch-and-release in practice and why the tagging programmes run from these boats have produced genuinely useful science.

Feeding and senses

A generalist pelagic hunter with an unusual willingness to investigate. Blue sharks take schooling fish — mackerel, herring, pilchard, scad — and a very large amount of squid, which in some studies dominates the diet. They will scavenge, they follow trawlers, and they are drawn from a long way down-tide by a scent trail. That is the whole basis of the British fishery: a rubby-dubby bag of minced oily fish streaming away from a drifting boat, and baits set at varying depths in the slick. The fish comes to the boat rather than the boat to the fish.

Smell dominates, and the practical consequence is the slick. Blue sharks locate a scent trail at considerable distance and work up it. They also carry the ampullae of Lorenzini, detecting the electric fields of living muscle at close range, and eyesight good enough that they visibly inspect a boat, a trace and a bait before taking it. The last point is the one anglers notice: a blue shark will often circle the transom looking at people looking at it, which is what makes the fishery memorable and what makes careless handling so easy.

Through the year

A summer visitor and no more than that. Blue sharks move into the western approaches, the Celtic Sea and the Irish and Cornish offshore grounds as surface temperatures climb through the first half of the warm season, are present while the surface stays warm, and move away as it cools. The fishery tracks water temperature rather than the calendar, and a cold summer moves it later and further offshore.

Distribution

Genuinely global in temperate and tropical oceanic water, from the surface down to several hundred metres, and one of the widest-ranging of all sharks. In the north-east Atlantic it occurs from Iberia to Norway, coming within range of the British and Irish south and west coasts in summer. The IUCN global assessment is Near Threatened, and the species is by a wide margin the most heavily caught shark in world fisheries, overwhelmingly as pelagic longline bycatch. That is a statement about the global species; what may lawfully be done with one where you are fishing is a separate question for the fisheries authority.

This is a biological range — where the species occurs, not a prediction that you will catch one. To browse the fishing geography FishingHQ holds, start at fishing places.

Why anglers care

The species British shark fishing is built on. A UK or Irish shark trip means a day boat running to deep water, a slick set from an anchored or drifting position, floats set at staggered depths, and blue sharks brought to the side to be unhooked and released. It is one of very few British fisheries that has become almost entirely catch-and-release by practitioner consensus rather than by rule, and one of very few in which recreational anglers have contributed serious tagging data. It is also the accessible end of big-game fishing: no long passage, no heavy investment, and a genuinely large fish.

Handling and returning

Almost every blue shark caught in Britain is released, and the handling is therefore the whole of the practice. Do not bring the fish aboard. A blue shark is unhooked in the water alongside, with the trace held by somebody wearing gloves and the hook removed with a long T-bar or long-nosed pliers; if it cannot be reached, the trace is cut as close to the hook as can safely be managed. Keep hands away from the mouth: the teeth are serrated cutting blades and a hooked shark rolls. The skin is dermal denticles and will abrade a forearm and part a leader. Blue sharks have no swim bladder, so a fish from depth suffers no barotrauma and releases well — which is exactly why lifting one out of the water for a photograph, unsupported, on a boat deck, is indefensible: the body is supported by cartilage and water, and an unsupported shark is injured by its own weight. Circle hooks set in the jaw hinge rather than swallowed, and a fight short enough that the animal swims away rather than being revived, are the two decisions that matter most.

How the British shark fishery actually works, and why it is a slick rather than a mark

Shark fishing off Britain and Ireland is not fishing a place. It is making a place.

THE SLICK IS THE FISHERY. A boat runs out to deep water over the shelf, stops, and sets a bag of minced oily fish — mackerel and pilchard, usually — hanging over the side so that the tide carries a scent trail away from the boat. The trail may reach for miles. Sharks working up it arrive at the boat, which is why the whole day is spent in one position and why the skipper's choice of that position is most of the skill.

BAITS ARE SET AT DEPTHS, NOT AT DISTANCES. Whole or flapper mackerel are fished under balloons or floats at staggered depths through the upper water column, spread down-tide so that the first shark up the slick meets one of them. Which depth produces varies with the day, which is the argument for setting several.

THE TRACE IS ABOUT ABRASION, NOT SUSPICION. A blue shark is not leader-shy. It is covered in dermal denticles and it rolls, so a length of heavy mono or wire next to the hook and a long rubbing leader above it exist to survive the fish rather than to fool it.

CIRCLE HOOKS ARE THE WELFARE DECISION AND THEY ARE NOW CONVENTIONAL. A circle hook fished on a slack drop and allowed to come tight rather than struck tends to find the jaw hinge, and jaw-hooked sharks release far better than gut-hooked ones. The change from J hooks in this fishery happened because anglers wanted the fish to survive, not because anybody made them.

AND THE SEASON IS SET BY THE SEA, NOT THE CALENDAR. The fish arrive with warm surface water and leave with it. A cold, late summer pushes the fishery later and further offshore, and there is no argument with that.

WHAT MAY BE DONE WITH THIS FISH IS NOT ON THIS PAGE. Size limits, retention, closed periods and protected status differ between administrations and are revised. Check the current position with the fisheries authority for the water you are fishing.

Practitioner consensus

Widely and independently recommended by experienced anglers and specialist sources. This is real angling knowledge, not proof: controlled evidence for it is limited, and FishingHQ records it as convention rather than as a demonstrated effect.

Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Contemporary UK sea angling practice as reported by practitioners: ground, seasonal timing, bait and method convention.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat, identification characters and biology of the fishes of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Shark Trust identification guides and angling best practice — The Shark Trust (Angling or fisheries organisation)Relied on for: Identification characters separating the British sharks, and the handling, unhooking and release practice asked of anglers.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated descriptions of species behaviour and regional angling practice, recorded as consensus rather than as scholarship.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Why the blue sharks Britain catches are young females, and what that changes

The North Atlantic blue shark population is one of the most strikingly segregated of any large fish, and the segregation decides what a British angler is holding.

MATING HAPPENS IN THE WEST AND PUPPING HAPPENS IN THE EAST. Adults mate in the western Atlantic; pregnant females cross the ocean; nursery grounds sit largely off Iberia and in the eastern Atlantic. Tagging — a good deal of it from recreational boats — has shown individual sharks crossing between the Americas and Europe.

SO THE SUMMER FISH OFF CORNWALL AND KERRY ARE MOSTLY IMMATURE FEMALES. Not adults on their feeding grounds; juveniles using a productive shelf sea. A two-metre blue shark, which is a memorable fish by any standard, is a young animal that has not bred.

THAT IS THE STRONGEST ARGUMENT FOR RELEASE, and it is a better one than a general appeal to conservation. Removing immature females from a population is the most damaging thing a fishery can do to it, and the recreational sector's contribution here is small enough that nearly total release costs almost nothing and is worth doing properly.

IT ALSO EXPLAINS THE PRODUCTIVITY DIFFERENCE FROM THE TOPE. A tope matures late, breeds slowly and carries a few dozen pups after a year. A blue shark matures at four to six years and carries litters commonly around thirty, sometimes far more. The blue shark is the more resilient animal by a wide margin, and it is Near Threatened rather than Critically Endangered for that reason — not because it is fished less.

AND THE GLOBAL PICTURE IS NOT THE BRITISH ONE. This species is caught in enormous numbers by pelagic longline fleets worldwide, mostly incidentally. Nothing a UK charter boat does moves that number. What a UK charter boat can do is release its own fish alive, and contribute tag returns that tell the people assessing the stock where the animals go.

Scientific evidence

Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.

The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species — International Union for Conservation of Nature (Conservation authority)Relied on for: The global Red List category and the assessment behind it, assessed 18 September 2018. A statement about the species across its range and not about any managed stock.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
ICES Advice on fishing opportunities, catch and effort — International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Stock assessment and scientific advice for north-east Atlantic fisheries, including the distribution and status of the stocks concerned.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Cefas science, advice and data on marine and freshwater environments — Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (Government fisheries body)Relied on for: UK marine fisheries science: survey data, distribution and the biological basis of management advice.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat, identification characters and biology of the fishes of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Telling a blue shark from the other sharks a British boat meets

The confusions are with the porbeagle, with a large tope, and — for a fish seen from above at a distance — with almost anything.

AGAINST A PORBEAGLE, THE BODY SHAPE SETTLES IT. A porbeagle is thick, heavy and muscular with a short blunt snout and a strong lateral keel on the tail stock; a blue shark is slim, long-snouted and keel-less. Two fish of the same length will differ in weight by a factor of two or more.

AGAINST A TOPE, LOOK AT THE PECTORALS AND THE TAIL. A tope is a houndshark with ordinary pectoral fins and a distinctive notched subterminal lobe on the upper tail — the tail appears to have a small second tail on the end. A blue shark's pectorals are extraordinarily long and its tail has no such lobe.

COLOUR IS DECISIVE AND ONLY IN THE WATER. The indigo back with a hard white line is unmistakable on a living fish alongside a boat, and gone from a dead one. Any identification made from a photograph of a landed shark should not lean on it.

AND THE SNOUT IS THE QUICK CHECK. Longer than the mouth is wide, and pointed. Short and conical means think again.

A note on why this matters beyond curiosity: several of the sharks a British boat can encounter carry very different protections in different administrations, and identification is the first step in every one of those questions. FishingHQ does not state what those protections are.

Practitioner consensus

Shark Trust identification guides and angling best practice — The Shark Trust (Angling or fisheries organisation)Relied on for: Identification characters separating the British sharks, and the handling, unhooking and release practice asked of anglers.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat, identification characters and biology of the fishes of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic identification characters, family placement, depth range and distribution as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Contemporary UK sea angling practice as reported by practitioners: ground, seasonal timing, bait and method convention.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Where to go next

Similar and related fish

Bull sharkBoth are requiem sharks in Carcharhinidae. The comparison is instructive rather than confusing: one is an oceanic wanderer of temperate and tropical seas, the other a coastal and estuarine specialist that enters fresh water.

What these connections rest on (1)

Scientific evidence — 1 connection

Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.

Bull shark
Taxonomic and practical relatedness recorded because confusable species matter more to a reader than a shared family does, with the evidence naming the species the edge is about.
- The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Identification characters, family placement and biology of Carcharhinus leucas and of the species it is confused with, as set out for the fauna of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic characters and family placement of Carcharhinus leucas as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the region concerned.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

How it is caught

What these connections rest on (3)

Practitioner consensus — 3 connections

Big-game fishing
A statement about how a species is fished, which is angling convention rather than biology and is labelled as such.
- Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Contemporary UK sea angling and shore gathering practice as reported by practitioners: ground, seasonal timing, tackle, bait and method convention.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated descriptions of technique, quarry behaviour and regional practice, recorded as consensus rather than as scholarship.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Drift fishing
A statement about how a species is fished, which is angling convention rather than biology and is labelled as such.
- Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Contemporary UK sea angling and shore gathering practice as reported by practitioners: ground, seasonal timing, tackle, bait and method convention.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated descriptions of technique, quarry behaviour and regional practice, recorded as consensus rather than as scholarship.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Livebaiting at sea
A statement about how a species is fished, which is angling convention rather than biology and is labelled as such.
- Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Contemporary UK sea angling and shore gathering practice as reported by practitioners: ground, seasonal timing, tackle, bait and method convention.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated descriptions of technique, quarry behaviour and regional practice, recorded as consensus rather than as scholarship.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Where it lives

What these connections rest on (2)

Scientific evidence — 2 connections

Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.

Inshore ground
A distributional claim about where a species is found, resting on the standard regional reference works rather than on angling report.
- The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat association, identification and biology of the fishes and inshore fauna of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic characters, family placement, habitat and depth range as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Open ocean
A distributional claim about where a species is found, resting on the standard regional reference works rather than on angling report.
- The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat association, identification and biology of the fishes and inshore fauna of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic characters, family placement, habitat and depth range as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Understanding this fish

What these connections rest on (2)

Scientific evidence — 2 connections

Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.

Cephalopods as prey
A diet claim recorded at group level, pointed at a modelled prey CATEGORY, because the reference works describe the diet as a group rather than by species. Naming a particular species the catalogue happens to hold would invent a precision the evidence never had.
- The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat association, identification and biology of the fishes and inshore fauna of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic characters, family placement, habitat and depth range as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Contaminants, and what accumulates in a fish
A link from a species or a place to the accumulation mechanism that decides whether what is caught there should be eaten, resting on published seafood-hazard guidance and on the species' recorded diet and trophic position.
- ICES Advice on fishing opportunities, catch and effort — International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Contaminant monitoring in marine biota and the accumulation of contaminants through marine food webs.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fish and Fishery Products Hazards and Controls Guidance — US Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 2022 (Standards body)Relied on for: Methylmercury in seafood, the species in which it accumulates, and the advisory approach taken to it.States this directlyPassage read and verified

Told apart from

What these connections rest on (2)

Practitioner consensus — 2 connections

Spurdog
A comparison a reader with the animal or the decision in front of them actually needs, joining two records that resolve one another.
- The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat association, identification and biology of the fishes and inshore fauna of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic characters, family placement, habitat and depth range as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Tope
A comparison a reader with the animal or the decision in front of them actually needs, joining two records that resolve one another.
- The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat association, identification and biology of the fishes and inshore fauna of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic characters, family placement, habitat and depth range as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Safety reading

What these connections rest on (2)

Authoritative guidance — 2 connections

Stated by a fisheries authority, scientific institute or recognised angling body. Authoritative, but summarising rather than demonstrating.

Handling fish safely
A link to a safety topic substantial enough to be read in full.
- RNLI water safety guidance: cold water shock and Float to Live — Royal National Lifeboat Institution (Water-safety or diver-training authority)Relied on for: Water safety guidance for coastal and inland users.States this directlyPassage read and verified
Sharks and spearfishing
A link to a safety topic substantial enough to be read in full.
- RNLI water safety guidance: cold water shock and Float to Live — Royal National Lifeboat Institution (Water-safety or diver-training authority)Relied on for: Water safety guidance for coastal and inland users.States this directlyPassage read and verified

Rules and access

Protected species, and why some fish may not be takenShark species carry different protections in different administrations, and identification is the first step in every one of those questions.

What these connections rest on (1)

Authoritative guidance — 1 connection

Stated by a fisheries authority, scientific institute or recognised angling body. Authoritative, but summarising rather than demonstrating.

Protected species, and why some fish may not be taken
A link to a rule CONCEPT rather than to any rule. The record carrying it renders the regulatory-variance notice.
- Angling Trust guidance for anglers — Angling Trust (Angling or fisheries organisation)Relied on for: The structure of angling regulation and representation in England, and the framework within which anglers are asked to check local rules.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- JNCC species and habitat conservation advice — Joint Nature Conservation Committee (Conservation authority)Relied on for: UK conservation designation and the framework of protected species and habitats.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Environment and conservation

Bycatch and discardsThe blue shark is the most heavily caught shark in world fisheries, overwhelmingly as pelagic longline bycatch rather than as a target, which is the context every recreational conversation about it sits inside.

What these connections rest on (1)

Scientific evidence — 1 connection

Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.

Bycatch and discards
An environmental effect attached to the thing that causes it, resting on an authoritative source rather than on advocacy.
- The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species — International Union for Conservation of Nature (Conservation authority)Relied on for: The global Red List assessment for the species concerned, and the population trend and threats recorded in it.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- JNCC species and habitat conservation advice — Joint Nature Conservation Committee (Conservation authority)Relied on for: UK conservation designation and the status of protected and priority species.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

Check the rules before you fish

Fishing laws, bylaws, access rules, seasons, bait restrictions and permitted methods vary by location and can change. Check the current rules from the relevant authority and the water you intend to fish before fishing.

Check with:

Current national or regional law for where you are fishing
Current local bylaws
The relevant fisheries authority
The landowner, club or fishery whose water it is
Any restrictions specific to the species or the method you intend to use

Sources for this page

The Fishes of the British Isles and North-West Europe — Macmillan, 1969 (Reference work)Relied on for: Distribution, habitat, identification characters and biology of the fishes of the British Isles and north-west Europe.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Diagnostic identification characters, family placement, depth range and distribution as set out in the FAO species identification sheets for the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species — International Union for Conservation of Nature (Conservation authority)Relied on for: The global Red List category and the assessment behind it, assessed 18 September 2018. A statement about the species across its range and not about any managed stock.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Shark Trust identification guides and angling best practice — The Shark Trust (Angling or fisheries organisation)Relied on for: Identification characters separating the British sharks, and the handling, unhooking and release practice asked of anglers.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Contemporary UK sea angling practice as reported by practitioners: ground, seasonal timing, bait and method convention.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
ICES Advice on fishing opportunities, catch and effort — International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Stock assessment and scientific advice for north-east Atlantic fisheries, including the distribution and status of the stocks concerned.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly

How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy.

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