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A 1,644-pound great white shark being tracked along the Outer Banks is leading an annual migration south for the apex predators, as they head for warmer waters in the Gulf of Mexico.
The 12-foot shark, named Scot, sports a satellite tracking tag that shows it’s off the continental shelf near Cape Lookout National Seashore.
It is one of three great whites with dorsal fin tags fitted by Ocearch currently tracking off North Carolina.
The other two are females (Penny and Miss May) and they are also big, at more than 10 feet each. They are currently farther north, with Penny off Pea Island and Miss May near the North Carolina-Virginia state line.
Tracking tags have revealed white sharks make “predictable annual migrations” in the fall from Newfoundland into the Gulf of Mexico, Ocearch said. Cooling ocean temperatures in the Northwest Atlantic seem to spark the migration.
“The sharks spend summer and fall primarily in coastal waters off New England and Atlantic Canada, feeding on high-calorie prey such as seals, before heading back south to warmer winter waters off the southeast U.S. from South Carolina to the Gulf of Mexico,” Ocearch officials noted in a report.
“White sharks demonstrate strong site fidelity, with individuals returning to the same location in multiple years, suggesting these animals use complex navigational cues to migrate over thousands of miles every year.”
It is suspected white sharks mate off the Outer Banks, but Ocearch is working to confirm that theory. Another mystery to be solved is why some white sharks go to extremes in their winter migration, traveling as far southwest as Cancun, Mexico, Ocearch said.
