For the past three weeks I have been on board the Princess II with Rodney Fox Shark Expeditions and have had the amazing and unique opportunity to dive with one of our oceans super predators; the majestic great white shark! Rodney Fox Expeditions offer you the rare opportunity to dive with these remarkable sharks around the Neptune Islands, South Australia. They are the only operator in the world where you can experience cage diving on the seafloor as well as surface cage diving with these sharks. I can honestly say it has been a phenomenal experience to be on the ocean bottom, surrounded by beautiful scenery and circled by such impressive creatures!
Rodney Fox Expeditions are working towards building up one of the largest shark photo-identification databases for these sharks, and use these images to help track their movement and migration patterns. The man responsible for most of the photo ID’s is Andrew Fox, who has been diving in this area with these sharks for more than 30 years and is so familiar with these animals that he can ID many of them by sight on a dive. On the last trip, we observed a total of 26 individual Great White Sharks, with a few that have not been seen around these islands before.
I have had the opportunity to work side by side with Andrew for the past few weeks building up this database, and we are in the process of entering ID shots for these newly identified sharks into the database, and of course choosing out some names to match their individual appearance and personality. This will help us establish a better understanding of the population structure surrounding the Neptune Islands.
The Fox Shark Research Foundation was established in 2001, by Andrew Fox, Rodney Fox and Dr. Rachel Robbins. With the use on non-invasive satellite tagging technology they are able to effectively observe and study the feeding behaviour, breeding, migration and population trends of this local species. Many of their research projects are in partnership with CSIRO and SARDI, and they are working towards understanding as much about these animals as possible.
It is around this time of year (May/June) that the super females start to show up around the islands. What’s a super female you ask? Female great white sharks are larger than males of the same age, and some have been seen up to 6 metres around these islands! I spotted a 5m female just last week, with any luck I’ll get to photograph one on my last trip to the islands!
This coastline has more to offer than just sharks though! There is an array of other sea creatures here, and we are heading out again in a couple of days to try and find some of them before we head to see the sharks. To find out what else you can dive with here, you’ll just have to look out for my next upload!
