NC winter shark mystery

[SeaBiscuit]

The wind is laying off and all the regulars will be out there bluefining starting tomorrow again. I need your help in trying to solve the mystery of this season's large NC sharks. During the last half of December there were many reports of sharks in the traditional Morehead city bluefining grounds.
Although many of the sharks encountered have been determined to be basking sharks, there have been confirmed reports of fair hooked large (15 - 20 feet) dark grey (lighter grey underside) sharks around. These sharks have teeth, pointed yet stubby nose and eat trolled bluefin baits. These fish jump and can clear the water by many feet! Many boats have reported losing battles to large fish leaving their leaders chaffed 20 or more feet from the hook. No one has landed one to my knowledge but folks have reported having them on the wire fair hooked.

In years past a good number of medium sized (100 - 200 lb) threshers have been caught in these waters around the bluefins.
Also in the past, hooked bluefins have been eaten by mystery sharks. Marty (wahoonbox) had video of a possible great white taking a fish while on the wire on the Runoff.

I have not seen the fish, but have talked to some seasoned pros who have and no one is yet able to identify them.

I would appreciate any first hand information any of you can provide on any such encounters this season. For the life of me, I can't figure out what these sharks may be. Situation would suggest porbeagles, but 1000 lb plus porbeagles and many of them would be unheard of.

Please post related information on this thread and I will do any work necessary to try to propose an id for these fish, or to get one of our marine science universities looking into this.

Thank you,
SeaBiscuit

[clt_capt]

It would be very interesting to know what type of sharks are chewing on the Tuna grounds. I know that at least 1 large thresher has been brought in recently.

[Fishfinder]

I would just guess that the sharks have probably been just a little bit over stated in their size. Yes there are plenty of Basking sharks in and around Cape Lookout this time of year, and we do get the Threshers up to 400 lbs. I think most are over stated in their length and weight, except for the Basling sharks that can reach 18 to 20 ft. in length. The person that can shed some light on this subject would be Dr. Schwartz at Duke marine lab on Pivers Island near Beaufort. Dr. Schwartz, if he is still working at Duke has been studying sharks from around North Carolina and around the Cape Lookout area for years. There are very many large sharks that hang around the Cape all year. After talking to some of the students that have worked with Schwartz they told me of stories that after they set longlines for sharks on the eastside of the Cape that they had heads of 8 to 10 ft. sharks that were left on the hooks of the longlines that were eaten by larger sharks, with only one or two bites. There used to be large concentrations of large tiger sharks from 600 to over 1000 lbs. caught around the Cape. There are also very large bull sharks, duskies, lemmon sharks, sand tigers and occasional greater hammerheads around the shaols. There could be another species of shark that has shown up in the last few years, such as the Porbeagle and there have been numerous confirmed sightings as well as pictures and the occasional capture of great white sharks around the Atlas Tanker on the eastside. May be following the bluefin!

Strange you should mention the large sharks. I have had a few anglers in the last few weeks express interest in fishing for large sharks and even asked about having tournaments for them. Shark tournaments are well received both up north and down in the Florida area. I have fished for large sharks for years and if you are looking for a good tug on the string, they can give you one!

Capt. Joe Shute

[gman]

Im anxiously awaiting a response to this thread as a shark nut. Historically makos and threshers attack trolled lures quite often but the water is pretty cold down there now I would think. Porbeagles are cold water sharks and people are hooking them off Mass right now but a 400lb porbeagle is considered huge.

Very intresting

[Sea Draggin]

It would be very interesting to know what type of sharks are chewing on the Tuna grounds. I know that at least 1 large thresher has been brought in recently.

Maybe 8 or 9 years ago the Wave Runner threw a 600lbr on the doc late on Sunday evening in December.

[SeaBiscuit]

Thanks captain Joe for a very good "review" of the shark situation at the Cape. Most of the large coastal sharks mentioned would not normally favor the high 50 lo 60 degree water temps, but could certainly tolerate them in order to get at the buffet! I will be sure to follow up with Dr. Schwartz, if he's still at it. I almost went to work for him in the late 80s!!

I would not start this thread unless I believed that some of these reports are credible. Some of the eyewitness accounts I have are from respected Morehead professional fishermen.

It is my hope that with the pros from all up and down our coast in this area, someone will be able to shed some light on this. If indeed the reports are exaggerated someone is bound to land one of these things on the bluefin tackle sooner or later. Hasn't happened yet, though, although there has been a good number of hook ups.

SeaBiscuit

[Capt_John]

I hooked a big shark that I thought was a huge bluefin several years back offshore of NW Places. After an hour and a half fight we got it boatside and released it after taking a few pics. I took the pics with a disposable camera so I can't put them on here if I can find them, but after talking to several people we decided it was a Porbeagle Shark. It was 10-12 feet long with all black eyes, pointed nose, looked like a cross breed between a Mako and a Great White.
That being said, I've seen lots of Basking Sharks, I've seen a big Thresher jump within yards of the boat, and I saw a Great White between the Knuckle Buoy and the shoals one day while trolling for stripers. It literally was just cruising on the surface and I trolled right up to it and it wasn't even phased by us. It was about the same size as the Porbeagle. It looked wider than than the Porbeagle we caught earlier that same year. I know Capt. Jay Blount is on here regularly, if I remember right he was nearby and saw it later on as well.

[SeaBiscuit]

I hooked a big shark that I thought was a huge bluefin several years back offshore of NW Places. After an hour and a half fight we got it boatside and released it after taking a few pics. I took the pics with a disposable camera so I can't put them on here if I can find them, but after talking to several people we decided it was a Porbeagle Shark. It was 10-12 feet long with all black eyes, pointed nose, looked like a cross breed between a Mako and a Great White.
That being said, I've seen lots of Basking Sharks, I've seen a big Thresher jump within yards of the boat, and I saw a Great White between the Knuckle Buoy and the shoals one day while trolling for stripers. It literally was just cruising on the surface and I trolled right up to it and it wasn't even phased by us. It was about the same size as the Porbeagle. It looked wider than than the Porbeagle we caught earlier that same year. I know Capt. Jay Blount is on here regularly, if I remember right he was nearby and saw it later on as well.

Hey captain John, thanks for the info. At 10 -12 feet that would have been a large porbeagle. Any estimates on the weight?
If by chance you can find the old disposable camera pictures and if the quality is decent, they can easily be scanned into jpg files that can be posted.
SeaBiscuit

[JB2C]

My buddy brought in a thresher last week. Seems like he said it was a couple hundred pounds. Also saw a large one last week ourselves. Not sure what brand it was, but it was big. Heard a guy on the radio talking about it and swore it was 18-20' long. Within a few minutes, we saw a large one in the same area just swimming along slowly on top. Not sure about the 18-20', but he probably wasn't too far off of that. Also had one chase our ballyhoo last week. Wasn't a real big one. Probably 8-10'. But had to reel like crazy to keep him off the bait. Sounds like the charter boys need to start running shark trips along with their BFT trips. Somebody goes out there and sets up a chum line in a good looking BFT spot, no telling what they'll hook into.

JB

[backman]

A number of people I trust, ie not your average Joe out for the weekend tuna madness, reported seeing great whites in the 14-16' range on the grounds.

I recall one report of an 80-100# tuna being eaten at boatside by a white; I know of a couple of incidents with seals being chowed down tight to Chatham and one guide/friend of mine had a white he reported as close to the side of his Kencraft 21 come up in the spread calmly; examine a bunch of stuff and dive and eat a swimming plug before going airborne and breaking off.

In days of yore when the Chatham/BB fishery had real tuna and lots of them we would see *large* jumping sharks which I used to think were huge makos, presumably hitting fish from below. I'm talking 10-12' long sharks, not "little" 400# makos.

I have also seen 3 seperate pictures of 1000#+ mako's; including one Dazed and Confused won the Oak Bluffs tournament with, caught amidst the Mass. tuna schools. One of those is from a guy who fishes w./ me regularly - he used to be wheelman on a stickboat and one stuck a 1100-something mako that was coming in on a fish they had tied off and were swimming.


I have never personally seen a white on the tuna grounds but am eagerly waiting for that moment.