Search is still on for Great Whites off Chatham/Monomoy Is.

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onshore
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Joined: Thu Sep 20, 2007 2:36 pm
Location: Melbourne

Search is still on for Great Whites off Chatham/Monomoy Is.

Post by onshore »

Here's a compilation of several reports on the ongoing search for GW Sharks off Chatham Ma and Monomoy Island

Great white sharks continue to prowl just off South Beach, according to state and Chatham officials.

"There are still sharks around, but they probably won't be here much longer," Robert Kehoe, a spokesman for the Executive Office of Energy and the Environment, said late last week.

The large predatory sharks headed south in early October last fall as the water temperature cooled. They spent January through March off the southeastern coast of the United States, according to information gleaned from tags that were attached to the sharks before they headed south.

State researcher Greg Skomal is still enlisting sharks for his research while they are around. On Sept. 19, Skomal tagged the summer's eighth great white shark, Kehoe said.

Skomal has has attached satellite tags to five sharks and acoustic tags to three, Kehoe said. The satellite tracking tags detach at a predestined time, float to the surface and transmit data by satellite to researchers.

Each acoustic tag emits a distinctive signal when a shark comes within range of fixed receivers in place off Chatham and up and down the East Coast to track striped bass, horseshoe crabs and other fish. The acoustic tags will help Skomal identify how long and how often a shark visits a site and any other patterns based on time or tide.

Through September, plane spotters have continued to see sharks "right up against South Beach in shallow water," Chatham Harbor Master Stuart Smith said last week.

That's why the town has maintained its swimming ban on the oceanside of South Beach and within 300 feet of seals, which are found in abundance from Chatham to Truro and are the preferred meal of the sharks.

Some beachgoers have objected to the town's ban "but it's definitely not a good idea to swim there," Smith said.

For more information, please goto www.capecodsharkhunters.com, the official website of theshark taggers


It's been a longer shark season this year. Last year, sightings of great white sharks didn't start until Labor Day weekend. This year's first great white sighting was on July 11, when a 15-foot shark was spotted attacking seals near shore in Orleans about two miles south of the public portion of Nauset Beach.

So far this year, a shark was spotted just once, Aug. 12, inside Chatham Harbor. That caused town officials to immediately close the harbor and Lighthouse Beach to swimming for about two days.

"Except for that one report, (sharks) haven't come into the harbor, to our knowledge," Smith said. "They come close to the inlet, and seem to be spotted right off the point at Lighthouse Beach."

Chatham may be shark central but researchers believe the great whites are patrolling up and down the Outer Cape coastline, with one shark sighted off the coast of Truro on Aug. 21.
Bill
Beach & Bay Inspector

onshore
Seasoned Fisher
Posts: 218
Joined: Thu Sep 20, 2007 2:36 pm
Location: Melbourne

Re: Search is still on for Great Whites off Chatham/Monomoy Is.

Post by onshore »

Sorry, but these two photos belong to my report above on the Great White Sharks off Chatham, MA
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
Bill
Beach & Bay Inspector

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