Shark depredation is a complex social-ecological issue that affects a range of fisheries worldwide. Increasing concern about the impacts of shark depredation, and how it intersects with the broader context of fisheries management, has driven recent research in this area, especially in Australia and the United States. This review synthesises these recent advances and provides strategic guidance for researchers aiming to charact...

Gillnets are size‐selective fishing gears commonly used by industrial and small‐scale fishers, so understanding selectivity can aid fisheries management by identifying suitable mesh sizes to optimize catches of target species while reducing bycatch. Few size selectivity parameters have been estimated for sharks, with even fewer for rays. Size selection parameters were estimated for seven species of sharks and two species of ra...

Marine protected areas (MPAs) are key tools in addressing the global decline of sharks and rays, and marine parks and shark sanctuaries of various configurations have been established to conserve shark populations. However, assessments of their efficacy are compromised by inconsistent terminology, lack of standardized approaches to assess how MPAs contribute to shark and ray conservation, and ambiguity about how to integrate m...

Fisheries management is essential to guarantee sustainable capture of target species and avoid undesirable declines of incidentally captured species. A key challenge is halting and reversing declines of shark and ray species, and specifically assessing the degree to which management is sufficient to avoid declines in relatively data‐poor fisheries. While ecological risk analyses focus on intrinsic ‘productivity’ and extrinsic...

Delineation of population structure (i.e. stocks) is crucial to successfully manage exploited species and to address conservation concerns for threatened species. Fish migration and associated movements are key mechanisms through which discrete populations mix and are thus important determinants of population structure. Detailed information on fish migration and movements is becoming more accessible through advances in telemet...

Two Australian endemic elasmobranchs, the Argus skate Dipturus polyommata and the eastern spotted gummy shark Mustelus walkeri , were collected from the by‐catch of a prawn Melicertus plebejus trawl fishery off Queensland. Age and growth parameters were estimated from growth band counts in vertebral sections of 220 D. polyommata and 44 M. walkeri . Dipturus polyommata males and females had an observed maximum age of 10 years a...

This study used stable‐isotope analysis to define the nearshore regional residency and movements of the small‐bodied Australian sharpnose shark Rhizoprionodon taylori . Plasma and muscle δ 13 C and δ 15 N of R. taylori were collected from across five embayments and compared with values of seagrass and plankton from each bay. Linear distances between adjacent bays ranged from 30 to 150 km. There was a positive geographic correl...

Estimates of life‐history parameters were made for shark‐like batoids of conservation concern Rhynchobatus spp. ( Rhynchobatus australiae , Rhynchobatus laevis and Rhynchobatus palpebratus ) and Glaucostegus typus using vertebral ageing. The sigmoid growth functions, Gompertz and logistic, best described the growth of Rhynchobatus spp. and G. typus , providing the best statistical fit and most biologically appropriate paramete...

Baseline, post‐angling and maximum attainable blood lactate concentrations were measured for the fishery species redthroat emperor Lethrinus miniatus to gain insight into the condition of fish released following c . 30 s angling and s.d . baseline blood lactate was 1·5 ± 0·6 mmol l −1 , which increased and plateaued around 6 mmol l −1 at 15–30 min post‐angling. These values were significantly lower than those obtained from fis...

This study examined the characteristics of a blacktip reef shark Carcharhinus melanopterus population in turbid coastal habitats through a multi‐year fishery‐independent sampling and tag–recapture programme. Results revealed a highly structured population comprised almost entirely of juveniles and adult females with individuals between 850 and 1050 mm total length effectively absent. Mature males were also rarely encountered w...

Life‐history characteristics of six tropical Lethrinus species sampled from the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area were compared. Two species groups were identified based on fork length ( L F ): large species with maximum L F > 640 mm (longface emperor Lethrinus olivaceus , yellowlip emperor Lethrinus xanthochilus and spangled emperor Lethrinus nebulosus ) and small species with maximum L F 480 mm (Pacific yellowtail emper...

Precaudal vertebral counts were used to distinguish between 237 morphologically similar Carcharhinus limbatus and Carcharhinus tilstoni and were congruent with differences in reproductive ecology between the species. In addition to differing lengths at maturity and adult body size, the two species had asynchronous parturition, were born at different sizes and the relative frequencies of neonates differed in two coastal nursery...

An array of acoustic receivers deployed in Cleveland Bay, north Queensland, Australia, passively tracked 20 adult spottail sharks Carcharhinus sorrah over 2 years (2009–2010) to define patterns in movement and habitat use. Individuals were present in the study site for long periods, ranging from 8 to 408 days (mean = 185). Size and location of home ranges did not vary over time. A high level of segregation occurred among C . s...

The life histories of two globally endangered hammerhead sharks, Sphyrna lewini and Sphyrna mokarran , were examined using samples collected from a range of commercial fisheries operating along the east coast of Australia. The catch of S. lewini was heavily biased towards males, and there were significant differences in von Bertalanffy growth parameters ( L ∞ and k ) and maturity [stretched total length ( L ST ) and age ( A )...

General consensus among scientists, commercial interests, and the public regarding the status of shark populations is leading to an increasing need for the scientific community to provide information to help guide effective management and conservation actions. Experience from other marine vertebrate taxa suggests that public, political, and media pressures will play an increasingly important part in setting research, managemen...