After 15 years of research dedicated to white sharks along the outer edge of Cape Cod, scientists in Massachusetts are now shifting their focus to new, previously unexplored areas.
“We’ve been really focused the last few years on fine-scale behavior, specifically, predatory behavior,” said Greg Skomal, senior fisheries scientist at Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries.
This research has happened, for the most part, in the Atlantic Ocean off the Outer Cape, Skomal said. It’s involved tools like acoustic, satellite and camera tagging by scientists on boats and pilots on shark-spotter planes.
The Outer Cape comprises Provincetown, Truro, Wellfleet and Eastham.
“We’re going to expand that work this year into Cape Cod Bay, to take a look at how Cape Cod Bay sharks may be behaving a little differently from those on the Outer Cape,” Skomal said.
Skomal is part of a team of scientists who go out on boats to tag and track white sharks off the coast of Cape Cod. They’ve studied where, when and how white sharks off the Outer Cape are most likely to feed on their primary diet of seals.
The researchers have now found a difference between sharks that populate different areas of the Cape.
In the Cape Cod Bay, the sharks aren’t eating seals — and they aren’t coming nearly as close to shore.
“White sharks in Cape Cod Bay don’t appear to be approaching shore because they’re feeding on fish, like striped bass,” Skomal said.
“When you’re feeding on striped bass, your behavior is going to be a little bit different than if you’re feeding close-proximity to seals on the Outer Cape,” Skomal said.
He added that there are less sharks detected by the acoustic receivers on the bayside, and the ones that are seen are “smaller, more juveniles than we see along the Outer Cape.”
“We expect to see those differences, and we’re pretty excited to investigate that,” Skomal said.
While there’s only been a few official shark sightings so far this summer, sightings are expected to pick up toward the end of July and beginning of August as per usual — and that’s when the scientists will embark on their new area of interest for the season.
