The Grey Nurse Shark (Carcharias taurus) makes a powerful first impression. With their bulky bodies, broad girth, and a mouth full of sharp, protruding teeth, they can appear genuinely dangerous to divers encountering them for the first time.
But the reality could not be more different. Despite their intimidating appearance, the Grey Nurse Shark is one of the most docile and passive shark species in Australian waters, responsible for virtually no unprovoked incidents with humans.
These sharks are primarily bottom-dwellers, though they often cruise slowly through mid-water and are known to rise to the surface to gulp air into their stomachs. This unique behaviour creates a pseudo–swim bladder that allows them to achieve near-neutral buoyancy — enabling the slow, ghost-like hovering that divers find so captivating.
Those fearsome-looking teeth are not designed to tear or sever. Instead, they are long, thin, and needle-like, evolved to grip slippery prey such as fish and squid, which Grey Nurses swallow whole using their powerful jaws.
Grey Nurse Shark Habitats & Behaviour
Grey Nurse Sharks hunt mostly at night, which means their true predatory behaviour is rarely observed. During daylight hours, they typically gather in gutter systems, rocky caves, ledges or overhangs and areas of strong surge or current
Seen this way, they appear calm and almost lethargic, slowly circling the same area in a seemingly aimless pattern. But this behaviour is intentional. As during the day, Grey Nurses rest and conserve energy, lowering their metabolism to a near sleep-like state.
It is this behaviour that makes them so accessible to divers — and therefore very vulnerable!
Grey Nurse Shark Status in Australia
The Grey Nurse Shark is known internationally as the Sand Tiger Shark (USA) and the Ragged-Tooth Shark (Southern Africa). In Australia, they belong to the carpet shark family of elasmobranchs.
Once common along Australia’s temperate coastline, Grey Nurse Sharks suffered extensive declines due to historical persecution, accidental capture in fishing gear, and extremely slow reproduction. They are now listed as Critically Endangered on the east coast, Endangered in Queensland and Vulnerable in Western Australia
One of the key reasons for their decline is their extraordinarily low reproductive rate — the lowest of any shark species. Females reproduce only once every two years. Gestation lasts 9–12 months, and during the final stage, the most developed embryos cannibalise their siblings inside the uterus (adelphophagy). As a result, only two pups — one from each uterus — are born per litter.
Although pups are large and capable swimmers at birth, this slow reproductive cycle means population recovery takes decades.
Distribution in Australia
Grey Nurse Sharks can be found on both the east and west coasts of Australia, although their numbers and distribution patterns differ significantly.
On Australia’s east coast, Grey Nurses inhabit a long stretch of New South Wales coastline, from Byron Bay in the north, down to Montague Island near Narooma in the south.
Well-known aggregation sites also exist in southern Queensland, including Moreton Island, Stradbroke Island and Rainbow Beach
Sightings in Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania, and the Great Australian Bight are rare.
A recent CSIRO study from September 2025 indicated that the adult eastern grey nurse shark population increased by 5% annually between 2017 and 2023. With the adult population increasing from approximately 1,096 to 1,420 individuals during that period. Which, although encouraging, many scientists fear the population may still be below critical mass, meaning recovery could stall due to an insufficient number of breeding individuals.
In Western Australia, Grey Nurse Sharks are most commonly found along the south-west coastline, though they have been recorded as far north as the North West Shelf.
The size of the west-coast population remains unknown. However, anecdotal evidence suggests it is in better condition than the east coast population, primarily because the intense historical culling that occurred in NSW did not happen in WA. Even so, commercial fishing practices continue to exert pressure, and the western population is listed as Vulnerable.
Back To: Australian Grey Nurse Guide