{"id":2071,"date":"2026-07-08T23:25:01","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T22:25:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/new-walking-shark-species-discovered-in-papua-new-guinea\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T23:25:03","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T22:25:03","slug":"new-walking-shark-species-discovered-in-papua-new-guinea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/new-walking-shark-species-discovered-in-papua-new-guinea\/","title":{"rendered":"New Walking Shark Species Discovered in Papua New Guinea"},"content":{"rendered":"
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While locals had long known of its presence, a recent scientific expedition along the shores of Papua New Guinea led to the description of a new species of walking shark, the tenth to be recorded.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hemiscyllium dudgeonae<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The sharks of the genus Hemiscyllium<\/em>, better known as the \u201cwalking sharks<\/em>\u201d or \u201cepaulette sharks<\/em>,\u201d possess the unusual trait of using their pectoral fins as legs to shuffle along the seabed as well as the low-lying reef ledges at low tide. Their diet mainly consists of small invertebrates.<\/p>\n

Read also<\/span> The Greenland shark, that mysterious shark that can live four centuries<\/span><\/section>\n

Named Hemiscyllium dudgeonae<\/em>, the new species was first spotted in March 2025, while it swam in less than a meter of water off Milne Bay, renowned for its seagrass meadows. As explained by Christine Dudgeon, the Australian scientist in whose honor the species was named, her team was initially searching for Hemiscyllium michaeli<\/em>, observed repeatedly in the area.<\/p>\n

Terrified by the glow of the flashlight, the roughly 75-centimeter-long specimen was gently captured by Dudgeon, who used a jiujitsu-inspired grip to quickly flip it head-down, plunging it into a state of tonic immobility. It was then examined aboard the boat used by the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt first glance, it was clear that its coloration and patterns [reminiscent of a leopard\u2019s coat] were different from those of other known walking sharks, which were remarkably similar in size and morphology<\/em>,\u201d explains Jess Blakeway, co-author of the new study, published in the Journal of the Ocean Science Foundation<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Read also<\/span> At 130 meters beneath Antarctica, the Under The Pole expedition observes an astonishing animal forest<\/span><\/section>\n
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A New Species in Danger<\/strong><\/h2>\n

In the days that followed, 11 additional H. dudgeonae<\/em> were identified during dives, and tissue samples were collected for nine of them. Back in the laboratory, Dudgeon and colleagues conducted a series of DNA sequencing runs that confirmed this was indeed a species new to science.<\/p>\n

According to Blakeway, rapid coastal development, the spread of palm oil plantations, and episodes of coral bleaching are taking a heavy toll on walking shark populations in Papua New Guinea. The fact that H. dudgeonae<\/em> is found only in Milne Bay suggests it could be the most threatened species of all.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis new shark highlights the region\u2019s extraordinary biodiversity, but it could well disappear in the absence of drastic conservation measures<\/em>,\u201d the researcher notes.<\/p>\n

Read also<\/span> Dogs don\u2019t just remember words: they also understand how to use their toys<\/span><\/section>\n

Earlier, it was a shark species believed to have vanished for half a century that had been spotted in the waters of Papua New Guinea.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2072,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1701,1875,1874,301,249,1873],"class_list":["post-2071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-discovered","tag-guinea","tag-papua","tag-shark","tag-species","tag-walking","generate-columns","tablet-grid-50","mobile-grid-100","grid-parent","grid-50"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2071"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2071\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2073,"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2071\/revisions\/2073"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.farmersforum.ie\/trends\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}