Her name is Mary Lee....and she was swimming off our beach yesterday

[Lochloosa]

16 1/2 Feet long and 3500 lbs.



Great white shark reaches Jacksonville Beach surf break


Ocearch founding chairman Chris Fischer was going to bed in Park City, Utah, when an email alert showed him the location of Mary Lee. His group, a nonprofit dedicated to shark preservation, had caught and tagged the giant shark off Massachusetts in September. It had been moving steadily south since then, moving near shore and away, again and again.

Now it had moved really, really close to shore.

“It looked like it was practically in a parking lot in Jacksonville Beach,” he said.

So at 12:46 a.m., Fischer called Jacksonville Beach police — just to let them know. Sgt. Tommy Crumley, the agency’s public information officer, said police took the information seriously. An officer stopped by the lifeguard station in the middle of the night to alert lifeguards there, and police checked the beach to make sure nobody was swimming.

On a cold winter’s night, no one was.

http://m.jacksonville.com/opinion/blog/400744/matt-soergel/2013-01-08/great-white-shark-reaches-jacksonville-beach-surf-break


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[Bay Boy]

1. Yikes!

So did they catch it and now they are going to release it?

[Lochloosa]

3. No, that pic was from the original tagging.

They are just monitoring it's movements. It's really not that unusal for us to have Great Whites here in the winter.

Just not one this big. There is another smaller (14 ft) male also offshore.

They are drawn by the cooler waters and the Right whales that are giving birth here.

[Marrah_G]

2. Some of the ones being tagged in and around Chatham MA are massive

Seriously massive. I grew up on Cape Cod summers, I love the ocean, but I have to say, I don't think I would go more then a few feet into the surf on the Cape now. I'll stick to swimming up north of Boston instead.

[1-Old-Man]

4. So, the fish has swum hundreds of miles and harmed no one, but fools panic

And try to take swimmers out of the water, as if there would be any in late December or early January. Have these people nothing better to do with their time?

[Lochloosa]

5. The water is not that cold here and no one is panicking.

We do have a lot of people still surfing right now. Winter is when we get the best waves.

[upaloopa]

7. Just a few weeks ago a great white killed

a surfer at Surf Beach here in Lompoc, CA.

[DreamGypsy]

6. Cool.

Although I am concerned a bit about the trauma that capture and tagging can cause to wild animals, the knowledge we gain may be the only way we learn enough to be able to preserve their species...or at least slow the march to their extinction...and great loss to the planet when these beautiful creatures are gone.

Lyrics from the Song 'You Say That The Battle is Over' by Dave Mallett

And you say that the battle is over
And you say that the war is all done
Go tell it to those
With the wind in their nose
Who run from the sound of the gun

And write it on the sides
Of the great whaling ships
Or on ice floes where conscience is tossed
With the wild in their eyes
It is they who must die
And it's we who must measure the loss

And you say that the battle is over
And finally the world is at peace
You mean no one is dying
And mothers don't weep
Or it's not in the papers at least

There are those who would deal
In the darkness of life
There are those who would tear down the sun
And most men are ruthless
But some will still weep
When the gifts we were given are gone

Now the blame cannot fall
On the heads of a few
It's become such a part of the race
It's eternally tragic
That that which is magic
Be killed at the end of the glorious chase

From young seals to great whales
From waters to wood
They will fall just like weeds in the wind
With fur coats and perfumes
And trophies on walls
What a hell of a race to call men

And you say that the battle is over
And you say that the war is all done
Go tell it to those
With the wind in their nose
Who run from the sound of the gun

And write it on the sides
Of the great whaling ships
Or on ice floes where conscience is tossed
With the wild in their eyes
It is they who must die
And it's we who must measure the loss
With the wild in their eyes
It is they who must die
And it's we who must measure the loss

[BlancheSplanchnik]

8. that poem...

The planet would sustain us and we could live as we like, and all the creatures here would still be fine if only we just were not so damn prolific.

National Geographic once called us an exterminator species. How sadly accurate.