Holy crap--the REST of the story!

Post by **Apalach** » April 21st, 2006, 10:06 am

Here's what happened when the GW overtook the yaker--nada! The shark dove beneath the yak and continued on its way while the yaker was looking about, trying to figure out where it went! Actually this pic was also taken during the research project in S. Africa into the behavior of the great white sharks there.

They definitely seem to have some behavioral differences from the California and Australian great whites--they seem to be less aggressive for one thing, allowing people in small boats to actually grab them by the snout and "mesmerize" them so they sink immobile to the bottom for a few seconds to a minute!

Recent research has discovered that the GWS is one of the longest distance open ocean swimmers ever known. A year or two ago, one of the Northern California (Farallon Island) sharks from off San Francisco was discovered in Hawaii. That was big enough, but nothing compared to the latest report of Nicole (named after Nicole Kidman) who just completed the round trip from South Africa to Australia and back again, a distance of 12,400 miles in nine months. In fact, this same shark set a new speed record for an open ocean migration from Australia back to S. Africa, supposedly a trip of 6,900 miles, in only 99 days! I need to check the actual research data in Science Magazine, but the above figures are from a National Geographic article, and something may have gotten garbled in the translation.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news ... stest.html

Of course, GW sharks are still not all cute and cuddly, even the S. African variety, as this recent report will affirm.

http://www.cdnn.info/news/safety/s050605b.html

Post by **Cranfield** » April 21st, 2006, 3:58 pm

Great photographs.
They may not be Mans Best Friend, but they are still wonderous creatures.

I caught an 87lb blue shark off the west coast of Ireland, it was tagged and released.
About 3 months later the Charter Skipper received a notification that the same shark had been caught and released from tuna nets, 100 miles west of the Azores, which is some journey.