The team with a landed Great White Shark
I’m currently absorbed by the new series of ‘Shark Men’, which follows a group of marine biologists and fishermen who haul in (live) great white sharks to take samples and radio-tag them before releasing the sharks back into the wild to relay back their secrets via satellite.
Great white sharks are very under-researched and simple questions about their lives, such as where females give birth to their young, are still mysteries. The Shark Men aim to answer some of these questions and, as well as tagging, they take blood samples for testing hormone levels, DNA samples, and photos for ID referencing the sharks in future. It certainly makes for compelling watching – and I’d love to be a member of their crew; talk about a job where you’d be jumping out of bed with excitement every morning!
Shark Men California is on National Geographic Wild in the UK, daily at 5pm (repeat at 8pm) – and here‘s a clip of the old series to whet your appetite.
The Animal Explorer 