White Shark Research Project

Information from electronic tags tells us a great deal about shark behavior.

Tagging Sharks

In most cases, before a shark is returned to the wild, we fit it with an externally attached pop-up satellite tag with a tiny computer that collects and stores data—on temperature, depth and light (used to estimate position). On a pre-programmed date, the tag pops off the shark and floats to the surface. When the tag is recovered, the data on it are sent via satellite back to the laboratory where they can be analyzed. It's a huge advantage to be able to retrieve the data without having to recapture the shark. In some cases we recover the tag itself and can retrieve even more detailed information.

Sharks are outfitted with satellite tags that record their movements.

Sharks are outfitted with satellite tags that record their movements.

Project Goals

The Aquarium's white shark research project is a collaborative multi-year study of white sharks

off the California coast. The project has two primary goals: Tagging and Field Studies and Exhibiting a White Shark.

Goal 1: Tagging and Field Studies

We're conducting field studies to tag juvenile and adult white sharks and track where they go in the ocean. We're also taking DNA samples to learn more about their population structure. We want to study how white sharks fit into the ocean ecosystem so we can help fisheries managers develop better ways to protect them. This work is a collaborative effort with our research partners at Stanford University; the Tagging of Pacific Predators; California State University, Long Beach; University of California, Davis; PRBO Conservation Science; and the Pelagic Shark Research Foundation.

To date, scientists have tagged and tracked 16 juvenile white sharks and 143 adults. The juvenile sharks have tended to remain in the coastal zone from Northern California to Baja, Mexico. Adult sharks have traveled as far west as Hawaii.

We hope to learn more by configuring tags to collect data over longer periods of time. For example, we'd like to study whether shark behavior changes from season to season. We'll share our data with wildlife officials who can use the information in making fisheries management decisions involving white sharks.

The white shark tagging is coordinated by the Tuna Research and Conservation Center (TRCC), a partnership between the Aquarium and Stanford University. The Southern California Marine Institute and the Shark Lab at California State University, Long Beach, the University of California, Davis, PRBO Conservation Science, and the Pelagic Shark Research Foundation also collaborate in the tagging efforts.

White sharks are among the animals being studied by scientists with the Tagging of Pacific Predators (TOPP) program. TOPP is a collaboration among researchers from the United States, Canada, Mexico, Japan and the United Kingdom, aimed at understanding the migratory patterns of large, open-ocean animals in the North Pacific. The Aquarium is a partner in TOPP research and conservation efforts. More about the TOPP project.

Goal 2: Exhibiting a White Shark

White sharks on exhibit are powerful emissaries of ocean conservation.

While the first white shark was on exhibit, we were able to talk with nearly a million visitors about the biology of white sharks and the serious conservation issues they face in the wild.

Photo slideshow of the white shark's story. (2004)

White shark's journey from Malibu to
Monterey (2004) (1.7 MB)

Download a free white shark photo

Data from the electronic tag recovered from the young white shark released back to the wild in March 2005.

In the first month after we released our first white shark in March 2005, she traveled more than 100 miles offshore and dove more than 800 feet deep.

Exhibiting a young white shark allows us to contribute significantly to public understanding and protection of white sharks—an ecologically important and increasingly threatened species. Our ongoing efforts to study and possibly exhibit a young white shark began in 2002. Three times—first in September 2004 and again in both August 2006 and August 2007—we exhibited young white sharks in our Outer Bay exhibit and subsequently returned them to the wild.

In the first instance, we introduced a young female into the exhibit for what became the longest-ever exhibit of a white shark�198 days. In March 2005, we successfully returned her to the wild and then tracked her movements for 30 days.

We repeated the success in 2006, introducing a year-old male into the exhibit, where he thrived and grew for 137 days before we returned him to the wild in January 2007. He was fitted with a 90-day tracking tag that documented his travels to the southern tip of Baja California, Mexico�a journey that took him more than 2,000 miles, and to depths as great as 1,000 feet below the surface.

Our third white shark stayed with us for 162 days until we released him in Monterey Bay in February 2008. He was fitted with two tracking tags. One that remained with him for 148 days, documenting his migration along with the water temperatures and depths he favored. The second is a Smart Position or Temperature Transmitting (SPOT) tag that communicates his position via satellite when his dorsal fin breaks the surface of the water. That tag has a battery life of up to eight months. From that tag, we learned that the shark traveled south to Mazatl�n, Mexico in his first 50 days back in the wild. The public can track his movements almost in real time at the Tagging of Pacific Predators (TOPP) website.

We're also working with other institutions and agencies through our Center for the Future of the Oceans to help develop strategies for white shark conservation policy in California waters.

We received our first young white shark in August 2004, after she was caught inadvertently by commercial fishermen in Southern California. She was held in an ocean pen, where she remained in good health, navigated the pen well and began feeding. On September 14, she was transported to Monterey and placed in our Outer Bay exhibit. During her 198 days in this million-gallon exhibit, she grew from a length of 5 feet and a weight of 62 pounds to a length of 6-feet, 4½ inches and a weight of 162 pounds. She was fitted with an electronic tag and released on March 31, 2005. In the 30 days after her release, she traveled more than 100 miles offshore and dove more than 800 feet deep before the tag popped free near Santa Barbara.

During her stay, she was seen by nearly a million visitors and became, in the words of Aquarium Executive Director Julie Packard, "the most powerful emissary for ocean conservation in our history."

Our husbandry collectors caught our second and somewhat larger white shark in August 2006 offshore in Santa Monica Bay. During his 137 days at the Aquarium, he grew from a length of 5-feet, 8-inches and a weight of 103 pounds to his release size of 6-feet, 5-inches and a weight of 171 pounds.

Our third white shark was caught accidentally in a commercial sea bass net in August 2007, in waters off Ventura in Southern California, and was on exhibit for 162 days. On arrival, he was 4-feet, 9-inches long and weighed 67 � pounds. He grew to 5-feet, 10-inches and 140 pounds at release.

Our most recent white shark was collected on August 16 in waters off Southern California with the help of a commercial fisherman using a seine net. Like the others, she was kept in an ocean holding pen off Malibu in Southern California until we observed her feeding and navigating well in the confines of the pen. On August 27, 2008 we brought the shark to Monterey and placed her in the Outer Bay exhibit. She'll remain in the million-gallon exhibit as long as she's in good health and hasn't grown too large for us to return safely to the wild.

How to Help

Your consumer choices are the key to a future where healthy oceans are rich with sharks and other wildlife. Use our Seafood Watch pocket guides to choose sustainable seafood caught in ways that don't endanger sharks, sea turtles and other animals. You can view the guides online or download pocket-size versions.
As a nonprofit organization, we rely on support from individuals, companies and foundations to make our many ocean conservation, education and research programs possible. You can lend your support by making a gift today online.
Join our Ocean Action Team to stand up and speak out for conservation efforts to protect white sharks and sea otters, create marine protected areas off the California coast, and take other steps that will assure a future with healthy oceans.

White Sharks Need Protection

Globally, white sharks are threatened by human activities, and the World Wildlife Fund considers them to be among the top 10 "most wanted" species in the international market.

In October 2004, white sharks gained new protection in a global wildlife treaty approved by the U.N.-affiliated Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). The 166 member-nations in CITES approved regulations requiring a controlled system of permits for all international trade in white shark parts and products. Under the new regulations, trade will be closely monitored and may be banned altogether if white shark numbers keep falling.

Inspiring conservation of the oceans