A new study found that some great white sharks in South Africa may enter kelp beds to hunt for seals, a behavior that had rarely been observed.
Researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium have used satellite tracking tags equipped with underwater cameras to observe these large predators in their natural environment by providing a “shark’s-eye-view” of the ocean. Using technology similar to what was in the MBARI’s Shark Café Cam, researchers documented the foraging behavior within kelp beds which was in contrast to the generally held belief that the shite sharks in the area primarily surprise their prey by swimming up from below to attack animals like seals and sea lions at the surface of open ocean. The study, published this month in Biology Letters, suggested that white sharks may exhibit a different hunting strategy in a habitat that was once considered off limits to these large predators.
According to the study, “This is the first study, to our knowledge, to document extensive and repeated use of kelp forests by white sharks and to describe predator-prey interactions within this habitat.
“Our findings demonstrate the power of animal-borne video to improve our understanding of the habitat use of large marine predators and reveal interactions within the marine environment that would have remained hidden with conventional telemetry systems.”