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Photos: These 'Baby' Great White Sharks Were Just Released Off Montauk
By
Jen Chung
Published Aug 21, 2016
Modified Aug 21, 2016
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By
Jen Chung
Published Aug 21, 2016
Modified Aug 21, 2016
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You're gonna need a bigger boat—two young great white sharks were tagged and released off Long Island by OCEARCH as part of an effort to learn more about sharks and how they can survive here.
Montauk, a 50-pound, 4-foot female, and Hudson, a 67-pound, 5-foot male shark took the waters off Montauk yesterday morning, and Jon Forrest Dohlin, director of the Wildlife Conservation Society's New York Aquarium, said, "This is an exciting marine conservation event right here in our New York seascape."
According to the WCS, these two little sharks are the "first two white sharks tagged by the shark-tagging partnership in New York waters. The tags on these young-of-the-year sharks will allow scientists to track their movements up and down the coast for the next several years."
The team, which includes researchers from WCS, NOAA Fisheries, South Hampton Schools, Florida Atlantic University, New Jersey Institute of Technology, and Stony Brook University, collected blood samples, fin clips, parasites, muscle sample and took measurements of the sharks. Each sample provides baseline data previously unattainable for white sharks in this initial phase of life.
The team also acoustically-tagged two dusky sharks and one dogfish; and will be working off Montauk for another 6 days.
Tobey Curtis, lead scientist and Fisheries Manager at NOAA Fisheries, added, "We've learned a lot about the adult sharks in recent years, but the pups are still a complete mystery. Tagging these baby white sharks will help us better understand how essential Long Island waters are for their survival."
And Montauk has her own Twitter: @SharkMontauk. You can track her movements with the free online Global Shark Tracker or with Global Shark Tracker App (on Apple and Android)—she's still around Montauk!
This video shows how one part of New Zealand is where all the great white shark pups like to hang—maybe the millennials sharks will discover Montauk just like the humans:
By the way, the New York Aquarium is open today until 6 p.m.
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Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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