Great white shark – Page 5 – Syndication Server

Great white shark ‘fly-by’ results in rare double hookup

A prominent South Carolina sportfishing captain tagged his first great white shark of 2021 Thursday after he and a client hooked the same shark almost simultaneously.

“While we weren’t watching we had this girl come up and crush both baits on a fly-by and we landed her on two rods,” Chip Michalove, of Outcast Sportfishing, wrote on Instagram. “Exhausting day, as it was just myself and Pavel Vykopel, and he’s got a blown-out rotator cuff.”

Michalove, with Vykopel’s help, placed two scientific tags on the 12-foot shark before setting the apex predator free.

The white sharks that Michalove targets each winter migrate into South Carolina waters after the summer and fall feeding season off Cape Cod, Mass. However, they’ve been difficult to locate this year.

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“We’re already halfway through the season and it’s different,” Michalove told For The Win Outdoors. “The water in Cape Cod was unusually warm in the fall so it delayed the migration. Then, finally when they arrived it was 20- to 30-mph winds every day.”

Michalove and Vykopel made several moves before finding suitable conditions for setting up a chum slick. They were fishing with false albacore when the 12-foot white shark gobbled both baits to propel them into battle mode.

They had the shark alongside the boat in only 20 minutes.

Michalove, who runs out of Hilton Head, said this was the first white shark he has caught at this specific location.

“Now we’ve landed white sharks in 5 different spots off South Carolina, we’re getting better at figuring them out every winter.” he said.

–Images courtesy of Chip Michalove/Outcast Sportfishing

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Harrowing moments for father and son as shark attacks kayak

A Maui father-and-son survived a harrowing encounter with a large shark Tuesday as they kayaked together off the island’s west side.

Daniel and Tristan Sullivan were searching for whales when the shark – possibly a great white shark – bit and thrashed their kayak, spilling them into the water.

“When its mouth rose up and bit into the kayak, it was like a scene out of a movie,” Daniel Sullivan, the father, told Hawaii News Now. “The water streaming off of it, these giant teeth coming right at us, and then the way it just pushed the entire boat up halfway and pulled us back down into the water.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/CK0pdPJD3f3/

Both kayakers swam toward shore for about 35 minutes as the shark continued to bite their kayak. The paddlers were not injured.

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Hawaii’s Department of Land and Natural Resources issued a statement regarding the incident:

“Just before 2 p.m., a father and son reported to the Maui Dispatch Center that they were kayaking in the 1000 Peaks area (Ukumehame), when a shark attacked their boat. They fell overboard when the kayak sank, and they were able to safely swim to shore.

“They reported the shark as a ten-foot tiger shark. Personnel from DAR and DOCARE officers are now attempting to get more information from the pair.”

Tiger sharks are most often implicated in attacks on humans and/or their kayaks and surfboards in Hawaiian waters. However, the Sullivans said this shark’s snout was pointier than the more rounded snouts of tiger sharks.

Great white sharks are rare in Hawaii, but adult white sharks from the U.S. and Mexico migrate as far west as Hawaii during the fall and winter. Bite marks visible on the bottom of the kayak appear to be from a large shark.

Tristan Sullivan, 15, described the encounter via Instagram:

“Today my dad and I were out kayaking when a massive shark bit our kayak and flipped us into the water we tried to get back into it but it was taking on water fast and we kept falling back into the water. At the time we were about a mile out and eventually we had to leave our kayak and start swimming in knowing the whole time the shark could be right behind us thankfully we made it back safe.”

The DNLR closed beaches in the area and they were set to reopen Wednesday at noon.

–Image showing bite marks on the kayak is courtesy of Tristan Sullivan

Great white shark encounter literally a touching experience

Fishing took a backseat for some Florida anglers last Thursday when a large great white shark began to circle their 34-foot boat, at times within touching distance.

Erika Almond, owner of the Offshore Therapy vessel, captured the accompanying footage, which also shows the shark biting her outboard motors as the anglers watched in awe.

Capt. Tyler Levesque, who was hired by Almond to take her and a few friends snapper fishing, is the man seen touching the shark in the image atop this post.

https://www.facebook.com/FOX13TampaBay/videos/253536779732490/

“The whole experience was amazing,” he told For The Win Outdoors.

The encounter occurred 65 miles out of Venice in the Gulf of Mexico.

Almond explained that the shark, measuring perhaps 16 feet, appeared in a chum slick as the group was catching yellowtail snapper and mangrove snapper.

In a video recording, Almond stated: “The thing that made this even more interesting was this shark was not going to leave. He was there for about two to three hours, circled our boat continuously, bit the back of the boat several times, bit the motor several times, and even rolled on its back to show us its belly, as if it wanted us to pet it.”

Levesque said that at one point he fed the shark a longfin yellowtail that one of the anglers had caught.

Great white sharks are sometimes attracted to electrical impulses emitted by boat motors, and will bite them as a behavioral response.

Almond said Levesque touched the shark’s snout mainly to shove it from the motors.

The bites were not ferocious. However, Almond said that toward the end of the encounter the shark “came charging underneath the motors to attack them again, and hit them so hard that it caused boat to rock, and that’s when it took off.”

–Images courtesy of Erika Almond

Is Deep Blue the largest great white shark? ‘Not so fast’

A great white shark nicknamed Deep Blue is considered by many to be the largest of its species ever recorded. But a prominent researcher has cast doubt on that notion.

Michael Domeier, in a Tuesday Instagram post, featured a beautiful image of Deep Blue, captured by Kimberly Jeffries last January in Hawaiian waters off Oahu, along with two decades-old photographs showing equally massive white shark carcasses on beaches in Cuba and Taiwan. (See embedded post.)

The old photos were samples of other “ginormous” white sharks known to have existed. But Domeier, president and executive director of the Marine Conservation Science Institute, also used reason to support his “not so fast” assessment.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CJXM7ythZ3R/

“First, Deep Blue has never been scientifically measured or weighed,” Domeier wrote. “That would require being physically laid out next to a tape measure or photographed while being painted with a precisely calibrated paired laser system. That’s never happened.”

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The scientist, who has studied great white sharks extensively at Mexico’s Guadalupe Island and off California, added: “I have personally seen two massive sharks that could definitely exceed Deep Blue in size, one at the Farallones [west of San Francisco] and one near Pt. Conception, [Ca.].”

Domeier’s team first documented Deep Blue in 1999 “and she was already big back then,” he continued. “So she’s an old, beautiful shark, but no one can unequivocally claim she is biggest Great White in the sea.”

Deep Blue, estimated to measure about 21 feet, became famous after being featured by Discovery in 2014 (with footage captured in 2013). The photo atop this post is a screen shot from footage captured at Guadalupe Island, shared to Facebook by Mexican researcher Mauricio Hoyos Padilla in 2015.

Domeier on Wednesday told For The Win Outdoors: “As a mature female, Deep Blue likely returns to Guadalupe Island every two years during the mating season, but she is rarely sighted.”

The massive shark generated headlines in January 2019 when she was spotted off Oahu, feeding on a sperm whale carcass.

Great white shark circles whale-watching boat for 45 minutes

A great white shark grabbed the spotlight Sunday during a whale-watching charter out of San Diego when it circled the boat for 45 minutes.

A great white shark grabbed the spotlight Sunday during an all-day whale-watching charter out of San Diego when it repeatedly circled the 27-foot boat.

Domenic Biagini, owner of Gone Whale Watching San Diego, described the rare encounter on Facebook:

“A Great White Shark was patrolling a kelp patty, and decided it wanted to come take a closer look at our boat! For nearly 45 minutes this beautiful shark circled our boat at close range, making for a truly special encounter.”

Biagini told For The Win Outdoors that the 8-foot juvenile shark was sighted 15 miles offshore after his six passengers had viewed a pod of dolphins, and before they would encounter humpback whales.

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The footage shows two passengers at the bow watching in silent disbelief. But Biagini said the other passengers were alarmed and one asked, “Is it going to jump in the boat?”

Biagini captured the topside footage with a cellphone and first mate Kyle Henderson captured the underwater footage.

White sharks this size typically prey on small fish and rays, and are more commonly encountered in coastal waters.

Gone Whale Watching San Diego ran 8-hour trips Friday through Sunday and posted its sightings tally on Facebook:

–26 humpback whales
–2 fin whales
–2 minke whales
–1000s of common dolphins
–100 bottlenose dolphins
–1 great white shark

–Images courtesy of Gone Whale Watching San Diego

Watch: Great white shark hunts seal just feet from beachgoers

Graphic video footage captured Thursday off Provincetown, Mass., serves as a vivid reminder that great white sharks will swim into very shallow water in pursuit of prey.

Graphic video footage captured Thursday off Provincetown, Mass., is a vivid reminder that great white sharks will swim into very shallow water in pursuit of prey.

The footage, captured by Corey Nunes and shared to Facebook by the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy, shows a white shark devouring a seal just feet from shore at Race Point Beach. (Viewers are cautioned that blood appears briefly in the footage.)

“This is another good reminder that white sharks hunt in shallow waters off [Cape Cod] and, based on tagging data, we know that October is a peak season month for white shark activity off the Cape,” the Conservancy wrote in its description.

https://www.facebook.com/atlanticwhiteshark/posts/3426123937468897

The first video shows the shark herding the seal almost against the shore as onlookers react with laughter and awe. “I’m outta here! I’m outta here!” one of them says jokingly, apparently because the action is so close.

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The second video is more of the same, with the predation resuming a bit farther from shore.

Great white sharks congregate off Cape Cod seasonally to prey on seals. Tagging-based research by the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries, in partnership with the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy, began in mid-June.

However, peak activity is late summer through early fall. Last year, scientists tagged a record 50 great white sharks, beginning with the tagging of 15 sharks in July and ending with the tagging of seven sharks in November.

–Generic white shark fin image is courtesy of ©Pete Thomas

Surfer’s brush with great white shark caught on video

Matt Wilkinson heard a nearby splash as he paddled his surfboard Wednesday, but could not see the shark.

Matt Wilkinson heard a nearby splash as he paddled his surfboard Wednesday, but could not see the great white shark.

The former pro surfer also heard a drone whirring overhead, and its recorded message urging him to hurry ashore.

Wilkinson paddled safely to shore at Sharpes Beach in New South Wales, Australia, sensing that he had just been involved in a close call with an apex predator.

“I got to the shore feeling a bit weird and the lifeguards showed me the footage and I realized how close it came without knowing it was there,” Wilkinson told Surf Life Saving New South Wales. “It looks like it’s going for my leg and it changed its mind.”

#SHARK // @wsl surfer Matt Wilkinson has had a close encounter with a shark while surfing at #Ballina today.
The arrival of a #drone overhead alerted Matt via a warning over the speaker, at the same time a 1.5m shark appeared.

Full story 🗞️ https://t.co/rrJ8gkxZMl pic.twitter.com/KvWqjN1Teb

— Surf Life Saving NSW (@slsnsw) October 7, 2020

The footage, captured via an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle operated by Surf Life Saving NSW, shows a small white shark in front of Wilkinson and circling to approach from behind.

The shark is only inches from Wilkinson’s feet before it quickly veers, perhaps spooked by the large drone.

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It was not the first close shark encounter for Wilkinson, who was in the lineup at J-Bay in South Africa when fellow World Surf League competitor Mick Fanning was harassed by a larger white shark in 2015.

“I feel grateful and pretty weird at the same time but happy it decided not to go me,” Wilkinson told Surf Life Saving NSW. “When I saw the footage I saw the similarities, like I had a yellow leg rope on and Mick’s board was yellow is what I was thinking about when I came in.

“I called my wife because I didn’t want her to see the footage before I saw it. She doesn’t want me surfing for a couple of days now.”

The government-funded UAV program, designed to detect the presence of sharks and other threats, is operated by Surf Life Saving NSW and used at 34 locations.

Said UAV operator Beau Monks of Wilkinson’s encounter: “[The shark] sort of came out of nowhere, then went right up to Matt. It moved pretty fast. I was tracking it and notified the lifeguards and used the speaker on the drone to get everyone out of the water. Within 10 seconds it was at the surfer and five seconds later it was gone.”

Sharpes Beach was ordered closed until Thursday.

–Image courtesy of Surf Life Saving NSW

Spine of large shark discovered by lifeguards on cleanup duty

Lifeguards performing a beach cleanup in Wellfleet, Mass., on Thursday collected the backbone of what’s believed to be a large great white shark.

The rare discovery of a remarkably intact vertebrae was made on Newcomb Hollow Beach by Ethan Craven, Lydia Bicknell and Bri Griffin of Wellfleet Lifeguards, as they gathered debris in the aftermath of Hurricane Teddy.

“We think the animal was buried on the beach at some point and preserved; the storm uncovered this part of the skeleton,” Suzy Blake, co-head lifeguard, told For The Win Outdoors. “During storms like Teddy our beaches shift quite a bit. We get many things washed ashore from the waves, but also many things uncovered by wave action and the wind.”

Several comments beneath Friday’s Facebook announcement pertained to the seemingly immaculate condition of vertebrae, considering that sharks are cartilaginous and do not have bones.

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Greg Skomal, senior fisheries scientist for the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries, explained to For The Win Outdoors: “Although primarily cartilage, shark backbones have high amounts of calcium, which allows them to preserve well.”

Blake said the spine measured five feet and the largest vertebra measured 3.5 inches in diameter. Skomal did not speculate how long the shark might have been.

Wellfleet Lifeguards’ Facebook post included this description: “Yesterday, our guards made an amazing find during their morning beach sweep: a full spine of a marine animal. Upon further investigation (aka googling) and consultation with a few friends of ours (aka marine scientists) who know a thing or two about sharks, it’s likely this is the spinal column of a White Shark, and a pretty large one at that. ⁣⁣

“We’re sorry this guy had to perish, but happy that he (or she) left a little something behind as a message from the past about his (or her) visit to the Wellfleet beaches.”

–Images courtesy of Wellfleet Lifeguards

Huge great white shark swims close by; ‘Don’t go in the water!’

Cape Cod is known for great white shark sightings as a colony of seals in the region makes for an enticing menu for the apex predator. Video shows the latest sighting.

Cape Cod is known for great white shark sightings as a colony of seals in the region makes for an enticing menu for the apex predator.

Some sightings are spectacular. Some are simply amazing because of the proximity of the sighting, such as the one on Labor Day near Race Point Beach in Provincetown.

The huge dorsal fin of a great white shark was spotted as it swam back and forth for about 10 minutes, and as close as 10 feet from shore, according to Tamzen Tortolani McKenzie, who captured video of the sighting. It was shared by MassLive on YouTube.

“The morning started calm, quiet and overcast,” McKenzie wrote on Facebook. “Often the seals hang by the shore, but today was different. The dogs and screaming kids couldn’t spook them off. A good friend Peter said, ‘They are not moving because there’s a shark out there.’”

Sure enough, an hour later a great white shark made its presence known to beach-goers, its dorsal fin rising above the water line.

In the video you can hear a girl’s voice shout, “Don’t go in the water!”

“Pretty amazing!” McKenzie wrote. “And no injuries! It was quite a sight to see!”

She thought the shark was up to 14-feet long and upwards of 4-feet wide. Whatever the measurements, it’s safe to say that the dorsal fin indicated it was huge, and there was good reason the seals were hiding out near shore.

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Apparently, great white shark sightings have been constant in the region.

MassLive reported that “the shark season on Cape Cod this summer has been a busy one, with great white sharks seen regularly off shore near Orleans, Plymouth, Provincetown, Truro, Wellfleet and elsewhere.”

Stay out of the water, indeed.

Photos of seals along shoreline and the great white shark swimming close by courtesy of Tamzen Tortolani McKenzie.

Baby great white shark grabs spotlight on whale-watching trip

Whale watchers out of Newport Beach last week enjoyed a bonus sighting in the form of a newborn great white shark that swam near the boat.

Whale watchers out of Newport Beach last Tuesday enjoyed a bonus sighting in the form of a newborn great white shark that swam alongside the vessel for several minutes.

The accompanying video footage and still images were captured from aboard the Newport Legacy by Delaney Trowbridge for Davey’s Locker Sportfishing and Whale Watching.

Trowbridge told For The Win Outdoors that the encounter with the 3- to 4-foot shark occurred one mile off Crystal Cove State Park in Laguna Beach.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4BOEjlEaK4]

“It was an unbelievably lucky moment,” she said. “We almost never see sharks at the surface, and when we do the conditions are usually not nice enough to get a clear view of the animal. You usually just see a few inches or less of the dorsal fin.”

Also, small white sharks spook easily, but Trowbridge added, “This shark was very relaxed with us.”

Asked to confirm the ID, Chris Lowe, Director of the Shark Lab at California State University – Long Beach, told FTW Outdoors: “Looks like a white shark to me and based on its swimming pattern and body shape, I would say relatively newborn.

Lowe added, “There is a lot of shark activity along the coast right now, all juveniles and a lot of young-of-the-year (born this spring).”

Adult white sharks, which can measure to about 20 feet, typically prey on seals and sea lions near island rookeries. It’s not known precisely where they give birth.

Juvenile white sharks, which are on their own since birth, spend a lot of time in shallow coastal waters, where they feed on rays and other bottom fishes.

These are the sharks most commonly featured in video footage captured by drone operators.

However, sightings of newborn white sharks are rare, especially from aboard whale-watching boats, which typically operate well beyond the surf zone.

Said Trowbridge: “This one just calmly cruised beside us and everyone on board was completely amazed by just how well you could see this animal.

“Eventually we had to keep moving, though, and left it behind us. But within a half-hour we had come across over 1,000 common dolphins, two humpback whales, and thousands of birds.”