the female. The male bites the base of her right pectoral fin, leaving scars that are easily visible afterwards. After one or two minutes, mating is complete and the two separate. Females often mate with more than one male. Females mate only every second or third year. After mating, the females remain behind, while the males move off to seek other areas to feed, resulting in many observations of sand tiger populations comprising almost exclusively females. Reproduction and growth Reproduction The reproductive pattern is similar to that of many of the Lamnidae, the shark family to which sand tigers belong. Female sand tigers have two uterine horns that, during early embryonic development, may have as many as 50 embryos that obtain nutrients from their yolk sacs and possibly consume uterine fluids. When one of the embryos reaches some in length, it eats all the smaller embryos so that only one large embryo remains in each uterine horn, a process called intrauterine cannibalism i.e. "embryophagy" or, more colorfully, adelphophagy—literally "eating one's brother." While multiple male sand tigers commonly fertilize a single female, adelphophagy sometimes excludes all but one of them from gaining offspring. These surviving embryos continue to feed on a steady supply of unfertilised eggs. After a lengthy labour, the female gives birth to long, fully independent offspring. The gestation period is approximately eight to twelve months. These sharks give birth only every second or third year, resulting in an overall mean reproductive rate of less than one pup per year, one of the lowest reproductive rates for sharks. Growth In the north Atlantic, sand tiger sharks are born about 1 m in length. During the first year, they grow about 27 cm to reach 1.3 m. After that, the growth rate decreases by about 2.5 cm each year until it stabilises at about 7 cm/y. Males reach sexual maturity at an age of five to seven years and approximately in length. Females reach maturity when approximately long at about seven to ten years of age. They are normally not expected to reach lengths over 3 m and lengths around 2.2–2.5 is more common. In the informal media, such as YouTube, there have been several reports of sand tigers around 5 m long, but none of these have been verified scientifically. Interaction with humans Attacks on humans The sand tiger is often wrongly associated with being vicious or deadly, due