Jaws and Chips? — The Daily Jaws

Jaws and chips?

Here's some food for thought for those that like fish and chips, and there are plenty who will be eating it today (September 4th) as it is National Fish and Chip Day in the UK.

They say that today's news is tomorrow's chip paper, but what's in that chip paper may be an endangered shark with your chips. And no matter the amount of salt and vinegar, that's got to leave a bad taste in your mouth when it comes to protecting the species.

Sharks often get a battering in the media, turns out they could be getting a different sort of battering, from your local chip shop as you could well be eating an endangered shark from your local chippy.

Research has shown it turns out that chip shop fish sold as huss, rock, flake and rock salmon turned out to be spiny dogfish, a shark species which is classified endangered in Europe by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s red list.

Making the news even harder to swallow was that other species were also making into the fryer and fishmongers, including blue sharks, starry smooth hounds and nurse hounds.

The study, by the University of Exeter last year, took 78 samples from chip shops and 39 from fishmongers, mostly in the south of England.

A spokesman for the Department of the Environment, Fisheries and Rural Affairs (Defra) said chippies could only sell shark if they were caught "legally and sustainably".