The Royal Ontario Museum has opened a brand-new exhibit that aims to challenge the public’s perception of sharks. These are some of the things you can see in the wide-ranging exhibition that runs until Mar. 22, 2026.
The Royal Ontario Museum has opened a brand-new exhibit that aims to challenge the public’s perception of sharks. These are some of the things you can see in the wide-ranging exhibition that runs until Mar.
22, 2026.The Royal Ontario Museum is offering visitors the chance to delve into the anatomy, behaviour, and history of sharks, with a new exhibit. “The terrifying monster from the movie 'Jaws' is what many might imagine when they think of these animals, but they are far more fascinating and complex than their depiction in popular culture,” the ROM said in its description of the exhibition. The museum says it hopes to provide a unique look at the creatures through dozens of interactives and life-sized models. “The exhibition features a really spectacular parade of sharks that comprises three dimensional models of a variety of shark species,” Nathan Lujan, associate curator of fishes at the ROM, explained. “When you come into the exhibition, you're greeted by this enormous recreation of the head of a megalodon shark. The Megalodon was the largest predatory fish to have ever lived. It was about two school buses long and equivalent in weight to a herd of elephants.” Lujan said the “massive” shark was thought to have been driven extinct by the great white shark, which were about the same size as juvenile megalodon. “In the same area of the exhibition, we have a model of an adult great white shark. We also have a near-adult model of the whale shark, which is the largest living fish today. has different shark teeth and jaws, videos of sharks in their natural habitat… just a lot of information about sharks,” said Lujan. He told CTV News Toronto the exhibit is meant to challenge the public’s ideas about sharks, as he believes for most people, they “live in our imagination.” “I think you'd be hard pressed for any member of the public to really give you many facts about sharks. This really straightens that out and provides a lot of information about the history of sharks, where they came from, these ancient sharks like megalodon, our interactions with sharks, the threat that we pose to sharks and sharks pose to us, and really a representation of shark diversity overall.” Lujan said he hopes one thing that will be debunked by the exhibition is the misconceived notion that sharks pose a threat to humans. “People are more likely to be killed by a coconut falling on their head than by a shark,” he explained. “Nowadays, in Canada especially, there's a lot of attention on sharks because of their increased rate of observation around the Maritimes and a couple unfortunate shark encounters.” Lujan said it’s important to understand to what extent sharks actually pose a threat and why we’re seeing more of them now in the oceans around Canada. “We're not used to seeing those historically, and things like climate change, conservation measures that have protected seals, are bringing them into Canadian waters.” Outside of making sharks seem less dangerous, the ROM exhibit will also feature a wide variety of shark species. With over 500 different types of chondrichthyes—the scientific name for the fish class sharks fall under—Lujan said most people don’t know just how different each one is. “The diversity of sharks, I think, is really shocking to people,” he said. “I mean, you look at a wobbegong shark or a frilled shark or a goblin shark… these are not sharks that people typically think of when they think of a great white or something from ‘Jaws.’ They're bizarre looking sharks… There are sharks that invertebrates, crabs, and crustaceans and they have flat teeth. There are the sharks, like the great whites, that have steak knife like serrated teeth for cutting bites out of prey. But then there are other sharks with really sharp teeth that can't cut very well but can penetrate for grabbing prey that they swallow whole.” “In 2011 and 2012, there was a big effort in Toronto, and a few other Ontarian municipalities, to ban the consumption of shark fin soup,” he said. “The harvest of sharks for their fins is one of the leading drivers of shark harvest globally. Toronto has a large Asian diaspora community, where shark fin soup is part of the culinary tradition, which resulted in some opposition by business groups and citizens to that ban, but it really set the stage for a federal ban that remains in place today against the import of detached shark fins.” “Prior to the ban, Canada imported between 100 and 150 tonnes of dried shark fins every year,” Lujan said. He explained that the process of drying the fins makes them lighter and thinner than when they’re first harvested, making that 100-150 tonnes equivalent to around 200,000 to 300,000 whole sharks. The ban, along with Canada's Department of Fisheries and Oceans enforcing against harvests of shark fins offshore in Canadian waters, means hundreds of thousands of sharks are no longer being harvested for the Canadian market, Lujan said. “These bans really started at a municipal level in places like Toronto, Brantford, Mississauga that passed them locally first.” Overall, Lujan said the exhibition is meant to showcase the diversity of sharks and their impact on ecosystems. “There's this diversity of different morphologies that is linked with their ecologies and how they make a living in the wild,” he said. “The differences in how they look and their appearance shapes how they live in the ecosystem and then shapes their importance to us as members of the ocean. are protectors of sea grass beds that then generate oxygen that we depend on. So, the connection of sharks to the ecosystem on which we all depend, I think is a real critical message throughout the exhibition.” The Sharks exhibit officially opened to the public on Oct. 11 and will run until Mar. 22 of next year. It is located on Level 1 of the ROM in the Special Exhibition Gallery. It’s $9 for admission or free for ROM members. Exhibition-themed activities will also be available during specific periods, including hands-on activities daily, programming to get to know natures “misunderstood bad guys” on select weekends, and opportunities to design your own shark and model habitat at the end of November. “It's really family friendly,” Lujan advised. “I think kids are just fascinated with sharks and shark movies… any shark media. The models are at eye level, so it’s really catered to kids. The information depth is also enough that adults will find it really interesting too. I think there's a superficial value to just coming around and enjoying the models, enjoying the films, the videos that we have, and then coming back again and reading in greater depth and really learning everything the exhibition has to offer.”
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