Great White Sharks Are Coming North To Canada & You Can Track Where They Swim In The Ocean
It's that time of year again! Great white sharks are heading north for the summer and making their way to Canadian waters.
If you're interested in seeing where these sharks are swimming, you can actually track them as they move through the ocean.
OCEARCH, a non-profit shark research organization, has shared that great whites tend to spend the summer and fall around Canada's east coast — mostly near Nova Scotia but also around Newfoundland, New Brunswick, P.E.I. and even Quebec.
That's because the region is a "feeding aggregation" for the aquatic animals before they head south during the winter.
This year, at the beginning of May, the research organization posted a tweet about a young great white shark that has already started to swim northbound.
The shark, who is named Simon, is currently pinging off the coast of Long Island, New York.
He's a juvenile which means he's not as big as some of the other sharks on the east coast, measuring at 9 feet, 6 inches and 434 pounds.
Since OCEARCH only recently tagged the great white shark, this is the first time that Simon will be tracked as he moves through the ocean looking for a place to feed during the summer.
There are more great white sharks that are swimming off the east coast of the U.S. right now on their journey to Canada.
That includes Maple — 11 feet, 7 inches and 1,264 pounds — who is off the coast of Virginia, heading north from the Gulf of Mexico.
Jekyll (8 feet, 8 inches and 395 pounds), Andromache (10 feet, 8 inches and 341 pounds), Frosty (9 feet, 2 inches and 393 pounds), Breton (13 feet, 3 inches and 1,437 pounds) and Hali (10 feet and 697 pounds) are also off the coasts of North Carolina and Virginia.
Great white shark Ironbound (12 feet, 4 inches and 1,189 pounds) was last pinged off the coast of Florida, which is further south than he was at this time last year.
OCEARCH shared in 2022 that Ironbound was moving north toward Canada before any other sharks on the east coast.
Great whites usually start to leave southern waters in the Gulf of Mexico and off the U.S. east coast near the end of May and then arrive in northern waters at the beginning of June.
Ironbound was called "the leader of the pack" last year because his tracker showed he was already off the coast of New Jersey and New York at the beginning of May.
After making the move north before the other great white sharks, Ironbound made it to Canada and was swimming in the waters around Nova Scotia at the end of the month.
The research organization also said that this shark's journey north was an example of "site fidelity, returning to the same region in Nova Scotia year after year."
If you're curious to see where the aquatic animals are swimming right now or when they finally make it to Canadian waters, OCEARCH has an online great white shark tracker.
The sharks that have been tagged during expeditions in Canada and the U.S., including Irondbound, can be seen on the tracker map.
You can also find the sizes of these great white sharks along with information about when and where they were tagged and what their names mean.
This article's cover image was used for illustrative purposes only.
