Shark Chronicles 051 - Port control Port Control

“Port Control, Port Control, coming from Cheetah, over!”

The Oceans’ interns have experienced a fun packed and exciting few weeks starting with a seal predation from our tagged shark Alek, and ending with a bungee jump from the highest commercial jump from a bridge in the world! The interns are getting eager as the bigger sharks are starting to arrive to hunt the seals at Seal Island and as we witness more breaches. Each visit to the island thus far has been action packed with animated individuals, lots of tug-of-wars and many laughs!

There have been a few sessions of tracking Alek in June, who was named after a brave Oceans's friend but bad weather and the shark spending most of its time within the breakers made it difficult to carry on.

Despite it being winter in Mossel Bay, the interns have been delighted to have experienced such lovely weather in a very beautiful town with amazing scenery. Even the influx of interns from Miami have not complained much about the weather!!!

Aside from the morning and afternoon chumming trips and the patchy tracking of our famed shark Alek, we have completed stints of 24hour seal surveys and intermittent dolphin surveys from the lighthouse.

Almost all the interns have now seen all of the ‘marine five’ which includes the sharks, seals, dolphins, whales and penguins. The Southern Right whales have been coming in very close to shore and there have been a few sightings of Humpback whales as well from our boat Cheetah and from the lighthouse.

We look forward to more exhilarating chum trips and face-to-face encounters with ‘Ze German’ (a feisty female filmed by the German film crew) as well as many more of our favourite sharks. Aside from that we are looking forward to having more great times with great people. “Over from Cheetah… standing by!”

Fiona Graham and Siân Fôch-Gatrell

Shark Chronicles 051 - Alek 28-29 May

Our adventure of tracking Alek in Mossel Bay, like everything in doing research, had its ups and downs and in the last 3 days we have fully experienced it.

After the first 40 hours of tracking, Alek decided to move north to a very good fishing hotspot, a reef in front of the Grootbrak river mouth. In that part of the bay, white sharks love to spend their time very close to the break line, making our job of following them much more difficult.

After several hours where our tracking teams showed perseverance and dedication to the goal, the usual ping ping (the signal detected from our receiver coming from the shark) started to become less and less frequent - Alek moved into a more rocky area which may interfere with the normal detection of the sound coming from the tag.

At about 5 am, the signal disappeared completely and even after 2 hours of searching in the area, the tracking team could not find Alek and therefore the decision to suspend tracking was made.

The next day we went out chumming with the hope that Alek’s tag could be heard again. With all the equipment both for chumming and tracking on board, we sat the whole day at Seal Island. Since Alek had shown a preference for that area during the day, we were expecting him to come back there. Alek did not show up. Even more peculiar: we didn’t have a single shark at the island the entire day.

The next morning came and again we went chumming. The odds of having Alek back weren’t high since we know that white sharks move all along the South African coast. Every now and then, however, we switched the receiver on, hoping to hear Alek around.

All of a sudden smiles came back to our faces when we heard a faint ping…but then nothing for the next 10 seconds…then again another ping, a bit stronger, and then again another one. Enrico screamed :”Alek is back!” and we all stopped chumming and started rushing to get the boat ready for tracking. The signal was not strong but slowly we got closer and closer until we reached Alek, and the tracking commenced again in all its glory.

Shifts were organised, people woken up, food prepared and once again Alek showed us interest for the cage diving boat which arrived soon after. Alek spent the rest of the day at the island, but made no attempt to attack a seal. Maybe Alek is still learning how to become a successful seal hunter? Sharks are not taught by their parents on how to hunt, they have to fend for themselves from the first few minutes of their lives. The only way they can learn is by making mistakes and building experience - that is mostly likely what Alek was doing.

Again, like on the first night of our tracking, Alek moved to Hartenbos. Unfortunately at 3 am this morning the wind started to pick up and thus the swell size increased too much - the team was forced to stop tracking as Alek was swimming too close to the break line.

However, now we know that Alek is not a transient shark, and after this big cold front passes, we hope to find him again and get more insight into the day to day life of a white shark life.

Our hope – and curiousity – is strong.

Shark Chronicles 050 - Alek 26 May – shift 9-18

before and after the show

We change over at 9 am and surprise surprise... the shark was still at the island. Just after our arrival, the cage diving vessel joined us and for the first 2 hours the shark, even though being around, never showed interest on their boat.

But then Alek decided to investigate that strange rope with a fish head attached to its end, floating in front of that boat. Thus the crew rushed their clients into the cage, shouting to them "Down, go down!!!". The tourists took a big breath and dove into the cage right when Alek was opening its majestic mouth. And then the show began! The clients came up screaming and giving hi five to each other with smiles bigger than their masks. Alek performed for them for over an hour.

Then when everybody had the chance to meet the great white shark, the cage diving vessel left. Alek maybe a bit surprised by not having the bait in sight anymore, for the first time in 2 days, decided to show itself to our tracking team: AMAZING! Cruising like a torpedo but gently like a dolphin our shark made few circles around our boat before disappearing into the deep blue.

Alek then moved toward Hartenbos (a reef about 3 Km from Seal Island) and there it slowed down. Hartnebos is a particular reef in front of a river mouth which could provide enough oxygen into the water allowing the shark to swim very slow while still breathing (a white shark needs to swim in order to pump water into its gills and thus breath).

We left when Alek was still in Hartenbos facing the darkness of a South African night.

Shark Chronicles 049 - Alek 26 May – shift 1-9

During the 1-9am shift (which is pretty brutal hours on the sleep but very exciting none the less!) Alek the Great White headed back to the Island after we took over from Ryan and his team and went about its sharky business swimming in circuits round and round, possibly on the look out for lone seals. No predation attempts yet but surely it’s only a matter of time before Alek tries to take out a seal! A very exciting shark to be tracking, we've handed over to Enrico’s team….

Shark Chronicles 048 - Alek 25 May - shift 18-01

photo from the previous shift

Alek decided to leave Seal Island as soon as we took over the shift. For the first few minutes when you start tracking you are usually a bit rusty and there is a danger of losing the shark. We had a few worrying moments during this time, as Alek speed off at a great rate of knots along the coast away from the island, but we managed to stick with it.

After about 50 minutes of swimming along the coast it reached a reef called Hartenbos (a popular swimming beach in the summer) and began patrolling back and forth in front of the beach. It also slowed down which made the tracking a bit easier.

One of the cool things about tracking at night is the bioluminescence in the water that shines neon green as it is disturbed. At about 11pm, Alek came to the surface to investigate us and looked like it belonged in the matrix, as all its body was shining green. More soon..

Shark Chronicles 047 - Alek's adventure begins

Five interns went chumming in the morning with Oceans director Enrico with the intention of tagging a white shark to track it at least for the next 48 hours.

We anchored at Seal Island where we had 3 white sharks. Enrico tagged the third one, a 2.2 m white shark which we named Alek after Oceans Reasearch friend Alek …. Alek has a bit of white pointy nose and few scars along the body, showing us that Alek is a tough shark. Very inquisitive, in fact it passed close to our boat many times, but at the same time very cautious, making slow passes while observing us, almost knowing about our tagging goal.

Four of us have been tracking it since 11 am and now at 3 pm we are still in the vicinity of Seal Island. The shark indeed spent the first few hours hanging around the cage diving vessel. Even though the shark was always very close to their boat, unfortunately for the tourists onboard the shark never showed up.

Our shift will end at 6 pm when Ryan and his team comes out to change over.

To be continued..

Enrico, Claire, Becky and Shaun

Shark Chronicles 046 - A month of change

The beginning of each new month is always a busy and exciting time at Oceans, the beginning of May has been no exception.

We said goodbye to some interns, said hello to new interns and saw an increase in shark activity.

The last few weeks of April were a little slow, with big swells and poor visibility. During the middle of April a new shark (Flipper) was tagged and tracked for a total of 96 hours. When first tagged the shark spent much of its time in and around a pod of dolphins which is how it got its name.

‘Flipper’ made numerous trips from Grootbrak to the island but didn’t stay there for extended periods of time. This could be due to lack of seal movement around the island which has also been observed by recent seal surveys. Since the end of the tracking Flipper’s ultrasound response has not been heard, though it is still being tested for on chumming trips.

The beginning of May has brought good weather, calm conditions, and more shark action. Every day we go chumming is increasingly exciting, as we seem to be seeing more and more sharks with each trip. A baby seal decoy made from carpet has proved to be a success to help lure the shark to the bait – which was working great – until today when we weren’t quick enough and a stealthy shark snatched and ate the carpet seal in front of us!

We also did a dolphin survey last Wednesday from the lighthouse, only saw a few, but we were lucky enough to spot two large pods of over 100 bottlenose dolphins zooming past seal island whilst we were chumming last week. We managed to get pretty close; a few even breached allowing for photographs to be taken. While doing maintenance at the “Shark Lab” aquarium last week, some of interns saw an adult humpback whale and a calf breaching – we are now entering the migration season, so hopefully we will be seeing some more whale action soon!

During this last week, our aquarium manager Prince, and Oceans Education director Enrico, were received at the 2Oceans Aquarium in Cape Town for discussing possible collaborations with our Shark Lab for a specimens exchange program and our educational program.

Becky and Alex – Oceans Research interns

Shark Chronicles 046 - Good bye summer

As summer draws to an end and winter sets in, we believe big sharks to be coming into the area. The movement of sharks has already been observed, as we have not found many sharks in our old hotspot. Sharks have begun to be found around Seal Island again, which is typical of winter behavior. Juvenile seals are beginning to take to the water on their own to forage and their naivety and inexperience makes them an easy target for the sharks. This results in a lot of activity around the island. This behavior is beginning to be observed during the seal surveys, with much more data sheets being used.

The white sharks were illusive during the early part of the week but returned along with the arrival yesterday of a German film crew. Our chumming efforts were rewarded yesterday by attracting 10 sharks and today with 6 in the morning and 11 in the afternoon.

In the last couple of weeks we improved the appearance of the aquarium, giving it a funky make-over. Colorful posters were made, a new coat of paint was given and the shop expanded. As well, additional lighting and improving the oxygenation of the benthic tank has made a significant difference to the look and feel of the aquarium which has seen an increase in visitors as we approach the Easter holiday.

Coming with a new look are a few extra sharks and fish. A few interns went diving this week to collect new inhabitants for the aquarium, and would like to give a big thanks to Adventure Edge who gave their time and equipment for the collection of the sharks. With the new sharks a surprise came when the large pajama-jacket shark laid 2 egg sacks in the benthic tank. These eggs are now positioned in the back display, and everyone here at OCEANS is excited for the sharks to hatch.

A new octopus was also caught to keep the resident octopus company. At first this resulted in a fight-off, but now they’ve gotten used to each other, they respect each others space. We thought we had a handful with the first octopus’ cunning escape plans, rearrangement of the tank and doing ninja-moves at the sharks, two octopus will probably mean double trouble.

Dorien, Gill and Chris – Oceans interns

Shark Chronicles 045 - How a research project starts

With the new year comes new projects and goals for the Oceans team. Now a few months into 2009, we are beginning to decipher the patterns of Mossel Bay’s visiting population of Bottle Nose Dolphins. Each day a team of interns rotates through shifts at the St. Blaize Lighthouse (its view in the picture), observing the water for any passing dolphin pods. Early attempts at finding the dolphins proved unsuccessful as we could only spend a limited time at the lighthouse, between sharking and our other duties as interns. Now that our numbers are larger, we have redoubled our efforts at the lighthouse and are beginning to see results. Movement patterns are becoming clear, and more than once we have even been fortunate enough to get a boat in the water in time to find the dolphins for photo identification. As an intern, it is an especially enlightening experience to participate in building a research project from the ground up. Without collecting this fundamental data, larger and more complex studies would not be possible. We are paving the way for future interns and scientists to discover more about the fascinating network of life that live in, and pass through the beautiful Mossel Bay.

On the subject of redoubled efforts, this past weekend was also spent spreading the word about The Shark Lab aquarium, tucked away beneath the Big Blue Tapas bar and restaurant. The interns hit the streets armed with pamphlets and a newly discovered ability to network. Our hard work paid off, bringing in a swarm of visitors to see the native aquatic life of Mossel Bay that is currently rotating through the aquarium. With a three month holding policy, the Shark Lab residents are always changing. This ensures that no animal will spend their entire life in captivity, and means that there is always something new for visitors to see. Some new additions include a rare Black Musselcracker (Cymatoceps nasutus) and a very graceful Smooth-Hound shark (Mustelus mustelus). Our hope is to begin using the aquarium to research the possibility of a breeding program for threatened species, and look into the much debated subject of feeding and conditioning in sharks. Be sure and check us out!

Dylan – Oceans Intern

Shark Chronicles 044 - Just another day at the office

This week was a week of excitement and change here at Oceans. All the interns were reunited after the shifts tracking at Breede River. However, two of us were not back for long. We said a sad goodbye to Yolly and Marc, both going back in order to finish their undergraduate degrees at university. It was hard to say farewell to people we had all come to know quite well over the last month.

However, the ranks of the interns have not been thinning, because we have welcomed four new interns to the house: Dylan from Washington, D.C.; Stacey from Sheffield, England; Rachel from Whakatane, New Zealand; and Chris from South Hampton, England. Unlike the “old” interns, who had the opportunity to learn the art of shark wrangling together as a group, the new interns have been faced with the challenge of picking up everything as they go, learning from the others as well as the Oceans directors. Happily, the newcomers have been more than up to the task, and are already contributing fully to the Oceans team. In the words of Stef, the “well-oiled machine” continues to be as well-oiled as ever, with the new interns seamlessly integrated into our big sharky system.

The week began with a rather dismal weather report, with a forecast for high winds and big swell. On Monday we began the first half of another seal survey with daytime shifts on the roof of the Diaz hotel. Unfortunately, conditions did not remain ideal for continuing the survey at night from sea. Luckily, the following night conditions improved and allowed us to complete the survey without any problems. The rest of the week was spent at sea showing the new interns the ropes and at the aquarium doing routine feeding and cleaning.

The last bit of excitement came on Saturday. We had over a dozen sharks, some almost four meters, aggressively attacking the bait for a solid three hours. We had sharks partially breaching on the bait. The busy day at sea was capped off with a full breach as well as the passing of a large pod of over one hundred bottlenose dolphins. Just another day at the office.

Sam and Rachel - Oceans Interns