Japanese angelshark is eaten and the rough skin is made into a type of leather called shagreen for use in wood finishing. Angel sharks in general are highly threatened by commercial trawl fisheries due to their susceptibility to capture and low rate of reproduction, and angel shark species elsewhere are known to have declined markedly under fishing pressure. Trawling activity in the Yellow Sea and other parts of the northwestern Pacific is intense and, coupled with pollution, has had a serious impact on the local ecosystem. The Japanese angelshark population is suspected to have declined by up to 50% or more under
Shagreen a uniform surface), sometimes with inlay work of different coloured shagreen. Shagreen was a very common cover for 19th-century reading glasses containers as well as other utensil boxes from China. The early horse-skin variety of shagreen was traditionally prepared by embedding plant seeds (often "Chenopodium") in the untreated skin while soft, covering the skin with a cloth, and trampling them into the skin. When the skin was dry, the seeds were shaken off, leaving the surface of the leather covered with small indentations. Sources are not clear whether this was being done to imitate pearl ray-skin shagreen from East Asia