Smooth hammerhead
Sphyrna zygaena
Size, compared with you
You: 1.7 m. Smooth hammerhead: 5 m.
Bigger than a car. Grows up to about 5 m.
The smooth hammerhead is a big hammerhead with a wide, flat head. Unlike most hammerheads it likes cooler, temperate waters, and it is Vulnerable to extinction.
The weird bit
In summer, smooth hammerheads follow the cool water toward the poles, sometimes in schools of hundreds or even thousands of sharks.
Quick facts
- Where it lives
- Coast and shallows, Open ocean0 to 200 m down
- What it eats
- Bony fishes, rays, sharks, squid and octopus, and some crabs and shrimp
- How worried are we?
- In trouble (Vulnerable)Assessed in 2018 by the IUCN Red List.