In August 2022, what is called the “great white shark’s cousin”, a white shark, was satellite-marked in the sea just off Lofoten. Four months later, the same shark was recorded again, this time in the Canary Islands.
That’s what shark researcher Claudia Junge, who leads the research project Sharks on the Move, says.
– We expected that the shark would travel south, perhaps to France. That it should make it all the way to the Canary Islands was very surprising, says Junge to Dagbladet.
Fast and deep
After the researchers noticed the run of hope in Lofoten, it swam in a more or less straight way towards the Canary Islands at a speed of up to 100 kilometers per day. This is what shark researcher Junge says in an article on the Norwegian Institute of Marine Research’s website.
– It is simply fascinating to see how quickly the shark moves, and very exciting to be able to show the results of the marking we have carried out, says Junge.
She tells Dagbladet that the hope grab surprised even more:
– The shark went much deeper than we had expected. It must have been below 1,700 meters deep off the Canary Islands, says Junge.
LARGE: Håbrann can be up to three meters long and weigh 200 kilos. It has been defined as a vulnerable species, and now it appears that the population is “on the road to recovery”. Photo: Institute of Marine Research
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Each his own way
The reason why they are only now coming out with the findings is that this shark is one of three hopeful sharks, which were marked in 2022, and which are all part of a new scientific article where the migration pattern is followed.
The other two sharks were tagged in Ireland by colleagues at Trinity College Dublin, and had completely different migration patterns to the Lofoten shark, says Junge.
DIRECTIONS: The map shows the various routes taken by the three sharks. The blue line shows the Lofoten shark, which ran straight to the Canary Islands. Photo: Institute of Marine Research
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– What the three tagged sharks have in common is that they travel far and move fast. But it was very different where they left, she says and elaborates:
– One of the sharks tagged in Ireland mostly stayed in Irish and British waters. The other swam all the way to the Barents Sea, before taking more or less the same route to the Canary Islands as the shark we spotted in Norway. Later it swam back north.
According to HI, the researchers have more data on the migrations of the osprey to work with in the future. In August 2023, the tagging team from HI succeeded in tagging a further four hope runs outside Lofoten. These are marked both with satellite marks and with tracking marks.
