Leafscale Gulper Shark (Centrophorus squamosus)
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Vertebrate > cartilaginous fish (Chondrichthyes) > Fish |
| Red List Status: | (Not Relevant) [(not listed)(nr)] |
| D5 Status: | |
| Section 41 Status: | (not listed) |
| Taxa Included Synonym: | (none) |
| UKSI Recommended Name: | Centrophorus squamosus |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | (Bonnaterre, 1788) |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | (not listed) |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Endangered globally and in England, deep water shark knowledge is highly deficient. Vulnerable to bycatch. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Species specific research required & Red List status update. |
| Question 3: | At a landscape scale, would the species benefit from untargeted habitat management to increase habitat mosaics, structural diversity, or particular successional stages? |
| Response: | No |
| Justification: | This species would not benefit from untargeted management |
Species Assessment
| Current step on the Species Recovery Curve (SRC): | 1. Taxonomy established |
| Recovery potential/expectation: | Low - Combination or other (detail in comments) |
| National Monitoring Resource: | Opportunistic - insufficient |
| Species Comments: | Life history, pressures outside England. Any recovery of the stock is likely to be very slow. Threatened by bycatch in deep water fisheries (policy conflict). |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Development of specific studies to assess the distribution patterns of species and to estimate the spatial overlap with fisheries.
Action targets: 4. Autecology and pressures understood
Action type: Targeted monitoring
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: National
High priority sites:
Comments:
Key Action 2
Proposed Action: Incidental bycatch of leafscale gulper shark continues to take place in some deep-water fisheries targeting other species. Spatio-temporal management could be considered to further minimise bycatch (e.g. avoidance of some fishing grounds or times of the year where there is a spatial overlap between the target species of the fisheries and deep-water shark species). However, the information available is not adequate to frame such measures at present, therefore more research on this is needed.
Action targets: 4. Autecology and pressures understood
Action type: Pressure mitigation
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: National
High priority sites:
Comments: The species remains vulnerable to capture as bycatch in deep-water trawl fisheries for roundnose grenadier.
Key Action 3
Proposed Action: Update England Red List status
Action targets: 2. Biological status assessment exists
Action type: Status survey/review
Duration: 1 year
Scale of Implementation: National
High priority sites:
Comments:
Acknowledgment:
Data used on this website are adapted from Threatened species recovery actions 2025 baseline (JP065): Technical report and spreadsheet user guide (Natural England, 2025). Available here.