University of Delaware assistant professor Aaron Carlisle is part of a new study that uncovered a previously unknown white shark hot spot in the central Gulf of California. The study suggests that these low numbers for eastern north Pacific white sharks, especially those listed in the Gulf of California, might be underestimated.
Great White feeding ground
New study examines the presence of Great White sharks in a previously unreported location
Perhaps no other ocean creature lives in the human imagination like the great white shark. But while great white sharks might be plentiful in the minds of beachgoers across the country, there are only a handful of places in the world where white sharks can be consistently found. In those areas â such as Central California, Guadalupe Island Mexico, South Australia and South Africa â they tend to be found aggregated in small hotspots, often located around seal colonies.
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Between June and December 2017 alone, eight fishermen operating out of Isla San Esteban, Mexico, illegally caught and killed as many as 14 great white sharks. Plying the waters of the Gulf of California in small boats known as
pangas, they hunted down the enormous fish, hauled them to remote beaches, and dismembered them. To conceal their activity, they mixed the flesh in with their legal catch. From each shark the fishermen kept a tooth. From one, they extracted a full set of jaws.
Marine biologist Daniel J. Madigan, now with the University of Windsor in Ontario, was setting up a research project in the area at the time. While interviewing fishermen about their practices and the species they encountered, he heard rumors of shark poaching.