Hello internet welcome to my blog post today I will be showing you guys (And girls) my Week 5 create task! So lets get straight to the point. This week we read all about Sharks but the thing is I read this when I was a year four AND year five so you could say I am an expert at this. Anyways my create task I chose was a word glossary. I basically just chose word and added the prefix and suffix. It wasn’t much so I will just show is to you.
| Word from the text: | Base Word | Prefix or Suffix | Definition |
| (Example): Studied | Study | ied | Spent time reading, learning, or practicing a subject. |
| Endemic | Endemic | en/ic | The epaulette shark is an endemic species found only in the shallow coastal waters of the Great Barrier Reef. |
| Friction | Friction | N/A | The tiny tooth-like scales on a shark’s skin reduce water friction, allowing it to swim very fast. |
| Salinity | Salty | Changes in ocean salinity can affect where sharks swim because they need specific salt levels in the water to stay healthy. | |
| Cartilage | Cartilago | N/A | Unlike most other fish, a shark’s skeleton is made entirely of flexible cartilage instead of hard bone. |
| Skin | Skin | N/A | A shark’s skin is covered in tiny, tooth-like scales called dermal denticles that make it feel as rough as sandpaper. |
Oh yeah and by the way the text is down there.
Create task two
page one
All kinds of sharks live in the seas around New Zealand.
Some are small, others huge. There are sharks with stripes
and sharks with spots. Some sharks live in the deep ocean.
Others like shallow harbours. So what do these sharks
have in common?
Page two
All sharks are fish, although their skeletons are made from cartilage, not bone.
Cartilage is lighter than bone, and it’s tough but elastic. People have cartilage
in their hip and knee joints.
The skin of a shark looks smooth and shiny, but look again! It’s made of hard,
grooved scales that protect the shark’s body. These scales have another job.
When a shark swims, water flows along the grooves. This means less friction
so that the shark can swim faster.
There are more than 1,250 species of sharks
in the world. In New Zealand, we have 112 species.
They belong to three groups: sharks, rays and skates,
and deep-sea chimaeras (pronounced kai-meeras).
Many of the sharks found here live in all oceans,
but around twenty-three species are endemic to
New Zealand. We don’t know a great deal about
sharks, although scientists have studied a few
species, including the great white.
Page three
The great white is one of the largest sharks found in New Zealand. At birth
a great white measures around 1.5 metres, but it can grow up to 6 metres.
The female sharks are usually bigger than the males.
Like many shark species, a great white has a grey back and a white belly.
This is known as counter-shading. From above, the shark’s back matches the
dark water below. From below, it’s hard to see the shark’s white belly against
the bright surface. These two colours meet around the gills, where they create
patterns that are unique to each animal, just like a person’s fingerprints.
In one study at Stewart Island, scientists used these patterns to identify more
than 170 great whites. To find out where the sharks went during the year, the
scientists then tagged around fifty of them. They discovered some surprising
things. The great whites didn’t stick to the cool waters around New Zealand.
Most spent winter in the tropics. Some went to the Great Barrier Reef while
others went to Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji, or Tonga. A few of the sharks
swam south, to the subantarctic region, before heading back north. This told
scientists that great whites can live in water as cold as 3 degrees Celsius –
another new discovery.
All sharks are predators.
Some sharks eat very large
meals, such as seals or
dolphins. Others eat crabs
and tiny krill. It’s also a
shark-eat-shark world – the
big ones eat the little ones!
Page four
The biggest shark found in New Zealand is the whale shark.
The average length of an adult whale shark is 12 metres, although
they can grow to 18 metres. In the summer, when the sea is warm,
whale sharks are often found around Northland. Our smallest
shark is the pygmy shark. This species never grows longer than
27 centimetres – shorter than your school ruler!
Page five
live in harbours and estuaries right under your nose. You’ve probably
eaten them without realising. Most fish and chip shops sell rig under the name
lemonfish. Some people also use the name spotted dogfish.
A rig has a flat belly, and its mouth is on the underside of its head. This design
allows it to hug a harbour’s muddy bottom. Mud crabs and shellfish are a rig’s
favourite food, which is why its teeth are made to crush and grind. An adult rig
can grow as big as 1.5 metres. In spring, they come into shallow water, including
the Porirua, Raglan, and Kaipara harbours. These places are important breeding
and nursery grounds. After the females give birth, the adults leave for deeper
water. Because females mate with more than one male, shark pups born in the
same litter can have different fathers. Newborn pups stay in shallow water for
about six months, leaving in early winter.
After heavy rain, fresh water often floods the places where young rigs live,
changing the salinity level. When this happens, the rigs move to the mouth of
the harbour or estuary to be closer to the sea.
Page six
Eagle rays and stingrays are basically flattened
sharks that move along the sea floor. It’s easy
to tell the two apart. Eagle rays have pointy
wings, which they flap like a bird, and stingrays
have rounder wings.
One eagle ray species and two species of stingrays are commonly found in
New Zealand’s shallow waters. A third stingray species lives in the open ocean.
A good place to see eagle rays is Whairepo Lagoon on Wellington’s waterfront.
The lagoon is named after the eagle rays that visit during summer. It’s common
to see eagle rays and stingrays in places like this, especially when fishers feed
them scraps.
Eagle rays scavenge fish scraps, but they also have a clever way of finding
their own food. This involves using little holes, called spiracles, which are found
on top of a ray’s head. The ray sucks water in through these spiracles before
jetting it out through gills on the underside of its body. This blows away sand
and mud on the sea floor, exposing the crabs and shellfish that a ray
likes to eat. Sometimes, at low tide, you can spot the feeding pits
that hungry rays have left behind. Like a rig shark, an eagle
ray’s mouth is on the underside of its head.
Rig sharks have small white spots on their
back. Because of this, they’re sometimes
called the Bambi of the shark world.
Page seven
Eagle rays and stingrays are
popular items on an orca’s menu.
New Zealand orcas hunt in packs.
Once an orca catches a ray, it often
flips the ray like a pancake or spins
it like a frisbee. This is a way to avoid
the sharp barbs on a ray’s tail.
Chimaeras are small, mysterious sharks that live in deep water. Scientists are
still finding new species of them. Chimaeras are very unusual looking, which
is probably why they were named after the fire-breathing monster in Greek
myths. This monster was a mix of animals: a lioness, a snake, and a goat.
Chimaeras are also known as spookfish or ghost sharks.
A chimaera has smooth skin with no scales. Its big eyes have a reflective
layer at the back, just like a cat’s, so it can see in the dark. A chimaera also has
strange-looking teeth that grind up food from the sea floor. Most chimaeras
have a poisonous spine on their back.
Page eight
Sharks get a lot of bad press, but in New Zealand, fatal shark attacks are
rare. A person is much more likely to drown than be killed by a shark. In fact,
scientists argue that sharks themselves are under threat. Only seven species
of sharks and rays are protected by New Zealand law. The conservation
group IUCN lists four New Zealand shark species as vulnerable to extinction.
More than seventy of our shark species are caught by fishers, often by
accident. Sharks mature late and have few young, so this by-catch puts all
shark species at risk – not to mention your fish and chips!
Here is the glossary
endemic: only found in one place
friction: the action of one surface or object rubbing against another
IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature):
an environmental group that works to protect the natural world
litter: the young animals born to the same mother at the same time
salinity: saltiness
It’s kinda like my create task one isn’t it