September, 2017
Update on the whale shark data collected by our tags. Provided to Save the Blue by Dr. Mark Erdmann.
158580 Kodo: Sadly, it seems that Kodo’s tag is now on the beach in Merauke in southern Papua. We are hopeful that the tag simply worked its way out of his fin (something we’ve seen with a few other sharks after 16-20 months deployment), but it seems quite possible he was captured and killed. For a week or so the tag was transmitting from the fish market at Merauke, and now is on the beach. He had been hanging out in an area where there is a LOT of shrimp trawling, so it's possible the trawler pulled up his tag that had fallen to the bottom and now has it in their house. We’ll cross our fingers he’s still around - we’ve uploaded his ID into the global whale shark ID database, so perhaps one day he’ll show up in Australia or Indonesia. In the meantime, we’ve put out word to a colleague in Merauke and have asked him to try to locate the tag, as it's still transmitting, and offer a reward to the fisher who has it.
158581 Ke’Opulupulu: We had hoped to see him in Cendrawasih during our trip, but unfortunately Ke'Opulupulu didn't come say hello. His tag seems to have gone quiet again since late June/early July, when he was around Kwatisore. We're hoping we can find him when we are back in Cendrawasih in October for a few weeks.
158584 Merlin: While in Cendrawasih, one of the sharks we managed to catch and draw blood samples from was Merlin! We also found out why he hadn’t given us data in so long - the antenna on his tag was cleanly snapped off. Not sure how that happened, but we were able to remove the tag and download the full 17 month data set from his tag! That data will be analyzed over coming months, but its a great time series and we were of course also happy to get the damaged tag off him. I attach here two photos of him before we caught him (he had fishing line tangled on his tag), and then a picture of his fin once the tag was removed. I hope we can get some more photos of him in October to show you how nicely the fins heal - with some of the other sharks that we removed tags from, we saw them again 5 days later and the wounds were nearly completely healed!
158581 Ke’Opulupulu: We had hoped to see him in Cendrawasih during our trip, but unfortunately Ke'Opulupulu didn't come say hello. His tag seems to have gone quiet again since late June/early July, when he was around Kwatisore. We're hoping we can find him when we are back in Cendrawasih in October for a few weeks.
158584 Merlin: While in Cendrawasih, one of the sharks we managed to catch and draw blood samples from was Merlin! We also found out why he hadn’t given us data in so long - the antenna on his tag was cleanly snapped off. Not sure how that happened, but we were able to remove the tag and download the full 17 month data set from his tag! That data will be analyzed over coming months, but its a great time series and we were of course also happy to get the damaged tag off him. I attach here two photos of him before we caught him (he had fishing line tangled on his tag), and then a picture of his fin once the tag was removed. I hope we can get some more photos of him in October to show you how nicely the fins heal - with some of the other sharks that we removed tags from, we saw them again 5 days later and the wounds were nearly completely healed!