Female blue sharks have adapted to the rigorous mating ritual by developing skin three times as thick as a male's skin. Courtship is believed to involve biting by the male, as mature specimens can be accurately sexed according to the presence or absence of bite scarring if unable to glimpse the claspers on male sharks or the absence thereof on females. Females mature at five to six years of age and males at four to five. The gestation period is between nine and 12 months. The heaviest reported weight for the species was 391 kg (862 lb). The blue shark is also ectothermic and it has a unique sense of smell.īlue sharks are viviparous, with a yolk-sac placenta, delivering between four to 135 pups per litter. Occasionally, a female in excess of 3 m (9.8 ft) will weigh over 204 kg (450 lb). Occasionally, an outsized blue shark is reported, with one widely printed claim of a length of 6.1 m (20 ft), but no shark even approaching this size has ever been scientifically documented. The blue shark is fairly elongated and slender in build and typically weighs from 27 to 55 kg (60 to 121 lb) in males and from 93 to 182 kg (205 to 401 lb) in large females. The male blue shark commonly grows to 1.82 to 2.82 m (6.0 to 9.3 ft) at maturity, whereas the larger females commonly grow to 2.2 to 3.3 m (7.2 to 10.8 ft) at maturity. Large specimens can grow to 3.8 m (12 ft) long. Like many other sharks, blue sharks are countershaded: the top of the body is deep blue, lighter on the sides, and the underside is white. Blue sharks are light-bodied with long pectoral fins.
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