You’ve seen the photos. It looks like a pink, flabby alien that got stuck in a blender with a medieval spear. Honestly, the first time I saw a picture of a shark with a long nose—specifically the Goblin Shark (Mitsukurina owstoni)—I thought it was a bad Photoshop job. It isn't. This thing is real, it’s ancient, and it’s lurking about 4,000 feet under the waves right now.
Evolution is weird. Sometimes it gives us sleek, terrifying hunters like the Great White, and sometimes it creates a nightmare fish that looks like a soggy sock with a snout. But that "nose" isn't just for show. It’s a high-tech sensory array that makes our best military sonar look like a toy.
If you’re looking for a shark with a long nose, you might also be thinking of the Longnose Sawshark or the Birdbeak Dogfish. We’re going to talk about them too, because the ocean has a strange obsession with elongated faces. But let’s be real: the Goblin Shark is the heavyweight champion of this category.
What’s Up With That Snout?
The long, flattened protrusion on a Goblin Shark's head is called a rostrum. It’s not a nose in the way we think of noses—it doesn’t breathe or smell quite like ours. Instead, it’s peppered with tiny pores called the Ampullae of Lorenzini. These are basically electro-receptors. In the pitch-black "Midnight Zone" of the ocean, eyesight is pretty much useless. This shark with a long nose uses its snout to "feel" the tiny electrical pulses generated by the muscles of its prey.
Imagine being able to feel a heartbeat through thirty feet of water. That’s what’s happening here.
The snout is soft. It’s not a weapon. If you poked it (not recommended), it would probably feel like wet leather or firm gelatin. Because the Goblin Shark lives in deep waters where food is scarce, it can’t afford to miss a meal. The rostrum acts like a metal detector, sweeping the seafloor for crabs, squid, and small fish.
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Slingshot Jaws: The Horror Movie Feature
Here is where it gets truly bizarre. When people search for a shark with a long nose, they often see videos of a mouth shooting out of a face. This is "slingshot feeding."
Most sharks have jaws that are somewhat fixed to their skull. Not the Goblin. Its jaws are attached by elastic ligaments. When it gets close to a fish, those jaws catapult forward at incredible speeds. It’s almost like a frog’s tongue, but with needles for teeth. This allows the shark to snatch prey that thinks it’s safely out of reach.
Once the jaw retracts, the shark goes back to looking like a weird, sleepy pink tube. It’s a specialized adaptation for a low-energy environment. You don't want to chase fish when you live in the deep sea; you want to sit, wait, and strike like a spring-loaded trap.
The Others: Sawsharks and Longnose Dogfish
The Goblin Shark isn't the only shark with a long nose out there. If you saw something that looked like a literal hedge trimmer attached to a fish, you’re looking at a Sawshark.
People get Sawsharks and Sawfish confused all the time. Sawfish are actually rays. Sawsharks are true sharks, complete with gill slits on the sides of their necks rather than the underside. The Longnose Sawshark (Pristiophorus gunnni) has a snout lined with sharp, tooth-like structures called denticles. Unlike the Goblin Shark, the Sawshark actually uses its nose as a weapon. It thrashes its head side-to-side to maim schools of fish or to dig through the sand.
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Then there’s the Birdbeak Dogfish. It’s smaller, sleeker, and looks a bit more like a traditional shark that just happened to have its face stretched out in a taffy puller. You'll find these guys in the deep Atlantic and Pacific, usually around 2,000 to 4,000 feet deep.
Why Are They Pink?
If you see a "shark with a long nose" that is bright pink, it’s almost certainly a Goblin Shark. But they aren't actually pink-pigmented. They have translucent skin.
What you’re seeing is the blood flowing through the capillaries right beneath the surface. It’s a bit like looking at a very fair-skinned person who is blushing. In the deep ocean, red light doesn't penetrate. This means that being pink or red actually makes you invisible. To a predator or prey in the deep sea, a Goblin Shark looks like a dark, greyish shadow.
It’s nature’s version of stealth technology.
Finding These Creatures (Or Trying To)
You aren't going to see a Goblin Shark while snorkeling in Hawaii. It just won't happen. These are deep-sea specialists. Most of what we know comes from accidental catches by deep-sea trawlers or the occasional specimen that washes up in Japan, where the Kuroshio Current brings deep water closer to the shore.
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Scientists like Dr. Mitsukurina (who the shark is named after) and researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) have spent decades trying to film these animals in their natural habitat. We still have very little data on their mating habits or how long they live. We think they can grow up to 12 or even 20 feet long, based on some massive specimens found recently, but most are in the 10-foot range.
Misconceptions You Should Stop Believing
- They are "Living Fossils": People love this term. It’s a bit misleading. While the Mitsukurinidae family goes back about 125 million years, the modern Goblin Shark has continued to evolve. It’s not a "glitch" in time; it’s a highly refined survivor.
- They are dangerous to humans: Unless you are a deep-sea diver equipped with a pressurized suit exploring a submarine canyon at 3,000 feet, you are safe. Even then, they are sluggish. They aren't "man-eaters."
- The nose is a horn: It’s not hard. It’s not bone. If a Goblin Shark tried to ram something, it would probably hurt the shark more than the target.
Protecting the Unknown
The biggest threat to any shark with a long nose isn't a lack of food; it's us. Deep-sea trawling—where massive nets are dragged across the ocean floor—destroys the fragile habitats where these sharks live. Because they grow slowly and likely have few offspring, their populations can't bounce back quickly if they are overfished.
Even though we rarely see them, they play a massive role in the ecosystem. They are the cleanup crew and the apex predators of the abyss. If they disappear, the balance of the deep-sea food web collapses, and we have no idea what that would do to the rest of the ocean.
Actionable Insights for the Curious
If you're fascinated by the shark with a long nose, don't just stop at a Google search. The deep sea is the least explored place on Earth, and staying informed is the first step toward conservation.
- Support Deep-Sea Research: Organizations like MBARI or the Ocean Exploration Trust provide live feeds of deep-sea dives. Watching these can give you a real-time look at how these creatures move—it’s much different than a static, terrifying photo.
- Choose Sustainable Seafood: Many deep-sea sharks are caught as "bycatch." Using apps like Seafood Watch helps you avoid supporting fisheries that use destructive bottom-trawling methods.
- Check Out Museums: If you’re ever in Tokyo, the Numazu Deep Blue Aquarium has incredible displays dedicated to deep-sea life, including specimens of the Goblin Shark that you can't see anywhere else.
- Stay Skeptical of Viral Clips: Many "monster shark" videos use forced perspective to make a 3-foot dogfish look like a 50-foot leviathan. Always look for a sense of scale.
The ocean is full of things that look like they belong in a sci-fi novel. The shark with a long nose is just one example of how life adapts to extreme pressure and total darkness. It isn't a monster; it's just a very specialized neighbor we’re still getting to know.