Shark--IN ILLINOIS!

[Daniel My Brother]

Not what you expect to find on the shores of the Ohio River. Conservation Department says it's only happened a couple of other times this far north.

Here are some pictures:

http://www.kfvs12.videos.vmixcore.com/vmix_hosted_apps/p/media?id=13846580&item_index=1&all=1&sort=NULL

[zero limit]

Maybe they will eat those asian carp ;D

[SirSnookalot]

Bull sharks have traveled a thousand miles or more in India, called Ganges sharks there..........they are maneaters.

I'm not surprised, very cool.

[K_Mac]

DMB I catch them at Cedar all the time. ;D

I used to fish the Mississippi back in the day. I never saw a shark, but you never know what you might find in a river. The first time I caught a small sturgeon I thought I had discovered a new species. :

[Tin]

I figured you found it.  ;D

[Sam]

Bull sharks, the deadliest of all in the shark family, can live in fresh water and have been known to swim up rivers. 

[1inStripes]

They have been seen fairly high into the Mississippi before.

[scrutch]

That pic is not a bull shark.  Dorsal fin is too rounded, not a sharp point like a bull.   Also, bulls are a very stocky built shark, the shark in the pic is long and lean like a reef shark is built. 

I don't know what species it is, but I know it isn't a bull shark.

[cart7t]

That pic is not a bull shark. Dorsal fin is too rounded, not a sharp point like a bull. Also, bulls are a very stocky built shark, the shark in the pic is long and lean like a reef shark is built.

I don't know what species it is, but I know it isn't a bull shark.

You would be wrong.

The bull shark is the only member of the Shark family capable of living in freshwater... and they do it quite well.  Bull Sharks are well known to inhabit freshwater rivers in search for food.  Some can travel great distances. 

[Dan:]

how far would it have had to travel from the ocean?

[cart7t]

how far would it have had to travel from the ocean?

Roughly 965 river miles from the mouth of the Mississippi to Olmstead Il on the Ohio. Give or take 20 miles or so.

From Wikipedia:

The shark has traveled 4,000 kilometres (2,500 mi) up the Amazon River to Iquitos in Peru.[8]  It also lives in fresh water Lake Nicaragua, and in the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers of West Bengal and Assam in eastern India and adjoining Bangladesh. It can live in water with a high salt content as in St. Lucia Estuary in South Africa. After Hurricane Katrina, many bull sharks were sighted in Lake Ponchartrain.[9]  Bull sharks have occasionally gone up the Mississippi River as far north as St. Louis.

[Daniel My Brother]

Here's a quick update. Local news talked to a shark expert who identified the fish as a spiny dogfish shark. It was suggested that the fish did not actually swim this far north, but may have been thrown off a barge traveling up river.

[Sam]

The above makes sense.

Thanks for clarifying what the authorities said. 

[bass or bass ?]

Here's a quick update. Local news talked to a shark expert who identified the fish as a spiny dogfish shark. It was suggested that the fish did not actually swim this far north, but may have been thrown off a barge traveling up river.

That species of shark could not have survived that far inland from salt water on it's own. It must have been dumped. Bulls are the only ones that can survive indefinately in fresh water, and they frequently swim hundreds of miles inland up rivers.

[SoFlaBassAddict]

Bull sharks have traveled a thousand miles or more in India, called Ganges sharks there..........they are maneaters.

I'm not surprised, very cool.

First thing I thought about when I saw the thread title was Bull Shark.  I wouldn't have been surprised at all if it was.

[scrutch]

That pic is not a bull shark. Dorsal fin is too rounded, not a sharp point like a bull. Also, bulls are a very stocky built shark, the shark in the pic is long and lean like a reef shark is built.

I don't know what species it is, but I know it isn't a bull shark.

You would be wrong.

The bull shark is the only member of the Shark family capable of living in freshwater... and they do it quite well. Bull Sharks are well known to inhabit freshwater rivers in search for food. Some can travel great distances.

care to reconsider?   

[slonezp]

Here is the latest link

http://www.kfvs12.com/Global/story.asp?S=12476372