Through a program called SAFE – Saving Animals From Extinction – zoos and aquariums come together to support conservation of all 1,200-plus shark and ray species. The Minnesota Zoo is a proud partner of SAFE Shark & Ray. Abby Tatreau, one of our Aquarists, serves as program representative.

“There’s a real need for a rolling census of sharks and rays in human care across aquariums and zoos,” Tatreau says. “Everyone has been using different databases.”

That’s why Abby and the SAFE Shark & Ray are compiling information in the Chondro Census. It makes it simple for aquariums across the world to enter their population data and for researchers to analyze it.

The word ‘chondro’ refers to fish with skeletons made of cartilage instead of bone. The classification Chondrichthyes includes sharks, rays, and skates.

The Chondro Census also collects lab test results that provide insights into animal health.

“We need to know normal blood values for sharks and rays,” Tatreau says. “We don’t have a huge collection of data like that so the vets will take blood and we don’t have baselines for that species.”

This year, animal care and health staff will take blood samples from bamboo sharks in the Tropical Reef habitat on the Tropics Trail. They’ll tag them with transponders to ensure they aren’t sampled more than once, Tatreau says. She’ll send the samples to a lab; the results will be helpful not only here at the Zoo but also to our partners who care for bamboo sharks and study them in the wild.

But this database is just one initiative of SAFE Shark and Ray. For the Sustainable Feed Project, Tatreau also tracks what our sharks and rays eat.

“As an AZA institution, we want to be champions of sustainable seafood,” Tatreau says. “When we’re buying food for our animals, we’re asking ‘where did we get it, how was it caught, and how do we use it’?”

That helps us make more environmentally friendly food choices and ensure humans don’t catch more seafood than can be replaced by nature. With a third of all sharks, rays, and their close relatives threatened with extinction due to overfishing, it makes a big difference when zoos – and you – choose to buy sustainable seafood.