The Green Room

Surfer Magazine recently released an online report on springtime shark activity at Southern California beaches. Read the full article here:

According to the article, a ”6-foot long male Great White thrashing about in the shore break” was spotted at San Onofre State Beach in early March. The witness, Kelly Lewis, actually managed to get a picture of the thing (below).

But according to our own resident shark expert, Sean Van Sommeran of the Pelagic Shark Research Foundation, it turns out that the hyperactive shark flopping around on the beach wasn’t actually Whitey. When he heard about the strange encounter down south, Van Sommeran looked into it and once he saw the photographic evidence, determined that the above fish was in fact a Salmon Shark–not a known man eater.

Van Sommeran decided to set the record straight:

The shark pictured on the beach/tide-line (in the above Surfer Magazine online article) is not a juvenile white shark (Carcharodon carcharias). It is a juvenile or subadult Salmon Shark (Lamna ditropis), which is a close relative of White Shark and Makos and a fellow member of the Lamnid family of sharks. I’ve contacted the author of the article and associated shark attack specialists.

These sharks periodically strand elsewhere in California as well as Oregon, they are most common up in Alaskan and Canadian waters. Specimens collected had a carnobacterial infection of the head and nervous system causing these sharks to strand.

(For more information on specimen collection of stranded sharks check out this link to the PSRF website: http://www.pelagic.org/research/stranding.html)

These sharks are commonly mistaken by the untrained eye for white sharks but can be distinguished by subtle features of the head, pectoral fins and the tail section. The Atlantic and far southern Pacific have a very similar species (also Lamnid shark) called porbeagle shark (Lamna ditropis). The five species of sharks within the Lamnidae group of sharks are known for elevated blood pressures and temperatures and specializing in high performance fishes, other sharks and many species of marine mammals.

 Salmon Shark

Salmon sharks are not known to be a threat to humans although the larger adults (almost 10 total length and almost half a ton) are known to prey upon seals and porpoises; the larger specimens appear to be fewer and farther between, average adult size is perhaps 8′ total length.

(For more information on Salmon Sharks check out this link to the PSRF website: http://www.pelagic.org/montereybay/pelagic/salmonshark.html)

Please do make use of the information. Public education is very important to dull the hysteria as well as notify the public that these events and specimens are scientifically and environmentally important and that there is an animal rescue unit here locally (as far south as Santa Monica and as far north as Mendocino) that responds to fish and shark related stranding/rescue/collection events. We do assist with whale rescue and disentanglement events as well, on occasion.

Ciao,
Sean