Great White Sharks come to visit
by BETH COMERYin The
Providence Daily Dose
This weekend was an epic one for the Atlantic Shark Institute and our great white shark research. For the first time ever, an acoustic tag was deployed on a great white shark in RI waters! The tag was deployed by the crew of the F/V Buckeye and the recipient was a healthy, juvenile, female white shark that was seven feet long. She was tagged inside the Harbor of Refuge in Point Judith, RI.
The tag will last 10 years and will provide invaluable data on this young shark as we follow her travels along the eastern seaboard. A small number of white sharks have been tagged and even fewer have been juvenile white sharks, making this research critical to their long-term health. This is our second deployment in this study of young great white sharks and we couldn’t be more excited.
Big ups to the crew of the Buckeye. The ASI has enlisted the help of local fishermen who often snag sharks in their nets. (I wish that guy in the green shirt wasn’t leaning in so close like that. She could just whip her snout around . . . ) From the Boston Globe:
The tag is an acoustic tag, which was inserted near the shark’s dorsal fin after she was caught in a fishing boat’s net. After tagging the shark with the roughly $400 Vemco-brand device Dodd’s organization had provided, Ian Campbell and his crew aboard the F/V Buckeye out of Galilee took pictures and measurements and then released her back into the water.
So where is the Point Judith Harbor of Refuge? Way too close to my favorite
beach!
(Photo from Atlantic Shark Institute.)
Go here for more on the research being conducted.
