SNORES: SHARKS DO NEED THEIR BEAUTY SLEEP

According to new research some sharks do, to quote show me the way to go home from Jaws, get tired and want to go to bed.

But then, after 400 million years swimming in the oceans, you'd be a little tired as well.

A team from the University of Western Australia have written a paper in Biology Letters where they say: "We have provided the first physiological evidence of sleep in sharks."

They investigated signs of sleep in the draughtsboard shark, a 1-meter-long species found in the coastal waters around New Zealand.

Monitoring the sharks over 24 hours showing that their oxygen levels continued to decrease when they were resting.

In fact, more than five minutes in this restful state meant that these sharks were, well sleeping with the fishes. It's suggested that they were sleeping to help conserve energy.

But that didn't mean that their eyes were closed, although they were often closed when asleep during the day, which could be more to do with the presence of light.

At night 38% of sharks kept their eyes open, but everything else pointed to them being asleep.

More research is now set to be completed to see if this sleep pattern in sharks is replicated in any way in other shark species.

Words by Dean Newman

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