August, 2016
Update on the whale shark data collected by our tags. Provided to Save the Blue by Dr. Mark Erdmann.
PTT 158580 Kodo: This shark has now laid one of the most interesting tracks of any of the 15 sharks we’ve tagged. When I last wrote, he had made it to Mindanao in the Philippines after having crossed through the waters of Palau. He has now shot south into the Arafura Sea in eastern Indonesia and is currently offshore of the Kei Islands! He’s now covered nearly 4000 km since leaving Cendrawasih Bay! Sadly, somewhere along the way, he managed to damage his depth sensor on his tag, and so we aren’t getting valid readings any more on depth, so his depth record will forever remain 640m until we change his tag. Not sure what happened here - we had this happen to one of the other previously tagged sharks as well - but in that case it was very clearly due to a deep dive approaching 2000m that seems to have basically pegged the gauge. Its possible that’s what happened here too.
PTT 158581 Ke’Opulupulu: As with the last time I wrote, he seems content to hang out in Kwatisore region after having returned from his “walkabout” to the NE of Biak. He’s still in Cendrawasih after returning from his cool trip north and east of Biak. As I noted earlier, he’s apparently enjoying a good feed in Kwatisore region. Interestingly, of the 10 previously-tagged sharks, 7 of them are now hanging out back in Kwatisore too - even the ones that did the epic journeys up to Mariana Trench or down to the Sepik River outlet in Papua, New Guinea. We seem to be seeing an overall trend, now that we have a number of tags that have either passed the 1 year mark or are soon approaching it, that shows most of the sharks hanging out in Kwatisore from May until about December, at which point many seem to get restless and leave temporarily, returning to Kwatisore by May. That at least appears to be the trend from June 2015 through August 2016, and it will be interesting to see if that holds for 2017 as well. Max depth recorded for Ke’Opulupulu is still 625m.
PTT 158582 Pongo: He has mostly remained in Cendrawasih Bay since tagging, though moving around a bit. Pongo has now increased his depth record to the deepest of your 5 sharks at 688m! As I noted previously, we did manage to download his tag in May, and my master’s student Megan is working with this data. I've seen some of her recent plots on diving behavior, and it's pretty cool.
PTT 158584 Merlin: This little guy has also remained in Cendrawasih Bay, but did make a relatively long trip out to south Yapen island before coming back to Kwatisore. His max depth remains 350m.
PTT 158581 Ke’Opulupulu: As with the last time I wrote, he seems content to hang out in Kwatisore region after having returned from his “walkabout” to the NE of Biak. He’s still in Cendrawasih after returning from his cool trip north and east of Biak. As I noted earlier, he’s apparently enjoying a good feed in Kwatisore region. Interestingly, of the 10 previously-tagged sharks, 7 of them are now hanging out back in Kwatisore too - even the ones that did the epic journeys up to Mariana Trench or down to the Sepik River outlet in Papua, New Guinea. We seem to be seeing an overall trend, now that we have a number of tags that have either passed the 1 year mark or are soon approaching it, that shows most of the sharks hanging out in Kwatisore from May until about December, at which point many seem to get restless and leave temporarily, returning to Kwatisore by May. That at least appears to be the trend from June 2015 through August 2016, and it will be interesting to see if that holds for 2017 as well. Max depth recorded for Ke’Opulupulu is still 625m.
PTT 158582 Pongo: He has mostly remained in Cendrawasih Bay since tagging, though moving around a bit. Pongo has now increased his depth record to the deepest of your 5 sharks at 688m! As I noted previously, we did manage to download his tag in May, and my master’s student Megan is working with this data. I've seen some of her recent plots on diving behavior, and it's pretty cool.
PTT 158584 Merlin: This little guy has also remained in Cendrawasih Bay, but did make a relatively long trip out to south Yapen island before coming back to Kwatisore. His max depth remains 350m.