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Random Quote: Those who Know--Don’t Speak. Those who speak don’t Know!
Yup. A couple years ago I was out with a buddy and my kids. We saw a White and got within 15 feet of him. My kids wanted to know "Dad, can we touch it?" Just then the shotgun rod goes off.... We land a 140 pound bluefin.
My first reaction was "Boys, keep your hands and feet inside the ride at all times and no we can not touch the Great White Shark." My next reaction was "Get the fish away from the shark."
Love that article. Stu Smith and I grew up together as summer-kids in South Chatham-I accidently kicked out his front tooth when we were kids diving off a dinghy-and Billy Chaprales coached me as to how to harpoon tuna-good guy...
Are you guys saying tuna are always around Great Whites? If so, why is that? Seems to me they would try and stay away, no?
That was my exact thinking.... until I hooked up on two trips back to back. The first I described above. A week later another friend an I were in the in the same general area. We doubled up. As we wrestled with the two fish we saw a very big fin. This time it was about 100 yards away so I could not positively identify the fish. But it was a big shark.
I still can not explain why the tuna and sharks were that close. I would have thought the tuna would have avoided the shark or at least got lock jaw around them... But those are my observations.
Two trips in a row do not make a very good scientific sample rate. But that is all I have to go on....
I was stationed on Martha's Vineyard with the USCG back in the early 90's. It was well known that there were Great Whites in the area. We were on a lobster boat once and a 15' White passed right below us. I was surfing at Lucy Vincent beach once and came off my board. I bumped into a submerged rock and dam near sauced my shorts. It is funny to see people are so shocked. It seems obvious that if there are seals around there will be Great White sharks. I'm sure the global warming nuts will be all over this.
Are you guys saying tuna are always around Great Whites? If so, why is that? Seems to me they would try and stay away, no?
I think it's the other way around: Great Whites are around tuna. That seal colony has been there for years, but this is the first year that there have been this many whites in Chatham at one time (so far as we know).
__________________ I'm not a boater, but I play one on THT.
I would not want to be in the water with one. Saw this one ripping apart a whale years ago. 15' 6" 2909lbs. Has to be seen to be believed or appreciated.
Love that article. Stu Smith and I grew up together as summer-kids in South Chatham-I accidently kicked out his front tooth when we were kids diving off a dinghy-and Billy Chaprales coached me as to how to harpoon tuna-good guy...
CMP
There wee some stories going around that it isn't really all that uncommon for whites to show up there. Do you ever remember this kind of attention for it? well except for Jaws....
It's not at all uncommon, but nobody really talked about it except in the spring when they'd release one or two from the fish weirs inside the island...
Love that article. Stu Smith and I grew up together as summer-kids in South Chatham-I accidentally kicked out his front tooth when we were kids diving off a dinghy-and Billy Chaprales coached me as to how to harpoon tuna-good guy...
CMP
My introduction to sticking tuna was when I ran Billy's boat with him and a Hawaiian scientist about ten years ago. Billy hit at least ten Tuna with Pop up Tags that day. I had Billy and the Pilot yelling "your other left" all day. I don't think I saw a single fish before he threw, I'd just see the flash when he hit one. I have a lot of respect for the guys that can do it without a plane.
Greg Skomal set me up to go that day, otherwise I don't know Billy well.
It's not at all uncommon, but nobody really talked about it except in the spring when they'd release one or two from the fish weirs inside the island...
CMP
Some certainly may be due to increased seal population, but I think a lot is cultural changes. The local media used to always try to downplay stuff like this out of respect for the local tourism industry, but nowadays reporters will they'll do anything for their 15 minutes.
Great white stuff gets better and better 
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