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What We Learned
Location: Ensenada, MEXICO
12:30 PM
Day 5
by Wayne & Karen Brown |
We had a rocky ride back last night, but Socorro Aggressor is safely back at the dock and we arrived to great weather here in Ensenada!
We said "goodbye" to all our new friends, and Divemaster Rana. Now it is just a few hours until we return home.
We think about everything we saw, did and learned on our expedition...
- Guadalupe Island Conservation: Guadalupe Island is right now probably the best place in the world to see and study Great White Sharks! To help keep Guadalupe Island the major congregation and mating place for Great White Sharks the Mexican government is actively working to protect and conserve the area with limits on the number of boats and people who can visit. They also regulate how the shark cage diving operations are organized and conducted.
- Great White Shark Mating Center: Seeing both male and female sharks at Guadalupe Island probably indicates that Guadalupe Island is probably a mating area for Great White Sharks. Another reason for protecting the marine environment around Guadalupe Island!
- Love Bites: We saw some female Great White Sharks with bite scars on their bodies and pectoral fins. These bite marks are from male Great White Sharks. Since sharks don't have any hands or arms the only way a male can hug or hold a female is with its mouth...and those teeth are really sharp and can cut into the females tough skin. We assume that the skin of female Great White Sharks are like other species of sharks we have studied...Female sharks have skin about three times thicker than the male sharks so getting bitten will not hurt or damage them as much as it would for a male shark.
- Polite Sharks: We did not see Great White Sharks go into a feeding frenzy that we have seen with other species of sharks around the world. We saw that if two sharks were inspecting the same fish the younger/smaller shark would move away and allow the larger/iolder shark to try to catch the fish first. Whether this is a learned behavior or instinctive we don't know. We suspect that it may be a learned behavior because we saw some some male sharks with scars from bites from other Great White Sharks. These bites could be a result of intruding on another larger shark that is feeding. That shark would learn not to intrude on a larger shark that is feeding. (NOTE: The bites could also be from competing for females where the males would bite other males that are interested in the same female.)
- Learning How to Feed: Watching the Great White Sharks' different feeding strategies it seemed that the older sharks were more successful than the younger sharks at catching the fish we had put out for them. The older sharks ambushed the fish from below, but the younger sharks attacked near the surface. If ambush feeding was instinctive the Great White Sharks of all ages should have all used ambush feeding. So it looks like ambush feeding may be a learned feeding behavior.
Thank you for joining us on our Mexico Great White Shark Expedition!
If you would like to see our exciting video footage, HUGE Great White Shark Jaws, Megalodon teeth, and life-sized, 15-foot long inflatable Great White Shark, bring The Ocean Adventure to your school, library, museum, etc!
If you would like to go on your own Great White Shark Expedition, contact us or Aggressor Adventures.
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TODAY'S DATA
Ensenada, MEXICO
Position: 31º 51' N / 116º 37' W
Air Temp: 80ºF
Weather: light breeze, clear skies
Divemaster Rana with Wayne & Karen back at the dock.
Great White Shark Mecca - Guadalupe Island!
Female Great White Shark with bites around side and pectoral fin.
Male Great White Shark with bites around head and gill slits.
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