Location: Northeast Bay, Guadalupe Island, Mexico
Comments: Captain Dave reports via an Inmarsat satellite message that the great white shark diving at Guadalupe Island was quite spectacular today. Sightings today included good ‘ol Shredder, Bruce and Chica, as well as some smaller sharks, with up to four sharks around the Nautilus at one time!
The behaviour is reportedly very different than anything we have seen before with multiple shark breaches each day, lots of competitive behaviour between the individual animals and aggressive and high speed passes under the boat and off the transom. This is very different than the slower and graceful behaviour that we have seen in past seasons. I’m not sure what to make of it and am fearful that the root cause is hungry sharks because of a reduced stock of tuna around Isla Guadalupe.
We’ve been seeing greatly reduced stocks of animals up and down the coast this year with resident orcas (killer whales) venturing into territory that they have never visited before, starving grey whales, a disappearing stock of stellar sea lions and no significant returns of salmon. On the other hand (and on a much more upbeat note) perhaps there are simply more sharks in the area than we have seen before which is resulting in increasingly competitive behaviour.
Dave also reports that he was asked to pull the cages and return to port early with his ecstatically happy guests. Six clients chartered the entire ship and apparently got their fill of fantastic shark sightings in just a day and a half of “sharking!”
–Captain Mike
Weather: Sunny with cloudy periods, temperatures in the mid 70’s, 15 – 20 knot northwest winds, low swell in the anchorage.
Water: In-water visibility 150 feet.
