In May 2012, a satellite transmitter was attached to a subadult female white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) by OCEARCH as part of its shark expeditions in Gansbaai, a fishing town in Western Cape, South Africa. Twelve years and 37,178 kilometers (23,101 miles) later, a fisherman in Indonesia handed over the tag to Project Hiu, a local NGO. The tag belonged to a shark named Alisha, whose long journey had ended in 2016 in the longline gear of the fisherman in East Lombok, where she was originally misidentified as a mako shark (Isurus paucus). In 2024, when the fisher finally handed over the tag, it triggered an international effort to recover and identify the tag, providing new information for conservationists about the distance a shark can travel. Alisha’s journey also became the first documented movement of a white shark between South Africa and Southeast Asia, which was recorded in this paper published in June. “You’ve never really seen a shark displaced so far,” said Dylan Irion, the corresponding author of the paper and co-founder of Cape RADD, noting that Alisha traveled a lot farther than another female shark called P12 that made a similar journey from South Africa to Australia in 2004, completing a round-trip migration of more than 20,000 km (12,400 mi). Irion told Mongabay that Alisha’s journey was remarkable not just for the distance she traveled, but also because she passed through different habitats, from the cold-temperate waters off South Africa to the warm tropical waters in Mozambique, Madagascar and…This article was originally published on Mongabay

In May 2012, a satellite transmitter was attached to a subadult female white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) by OCEARCH as part of its shark expeditions in Gansbaai, a fishing town in Western Cape, South Africa. Twelve years and 37,178 kilometers (23,101 miles) later, a fisherman in Indonesia handed over the tag to Project Hiu, a local NGO. The tag belonged to a shark named Alisha, whose long journey had ended in 2016 in the longline gear of the fisherman in East Lombok, where she was originally misidentified as a mako shark (Isurus paucus). In 2024, when the fisher finally handed over the tag, it triggered an international effort to recover and identify the tag, providing new information for conservationists about the distance a shark can travel. Alisha’s journey also became the first documented movement of a white shark between South Africa and Southeast Asia, which was recorded in this paper published in June. “You’ve never really seen a shark displaced so far,” said Dylan Irion, the corresponding author of the paper and co-founder of Cape RADD, noting that Alisha traveled a lot farther than another female shark called P12 that made a similar journey from South Africa to Australia in 2004, completing a round-trip migration of more than 20,000 km (12,400 mi). Irion told Mongabay that Alisha’s journey was remarkable not just for the distance she traveled, but also because she passed through different habitats, from the cold-temperate waters off South Africa to the warm tropical waters in Mozambique, Madagascar and…This article was originally published on Mongabay

Mongabay recently published an investigation revealing widespread Brazilian government purchases of shark meat to feed schoolchildren, hospital patients, prisoners and more. The series has generated public debate in the South American country, which, perhaps surprisingly, is the world’s largest consumer and importer of shark meat. The procurements raise concerns because sharks are being overfished — globally, their populations in the open ocean have declined by an estimated 71% over the past half-century — and their meat tends to contain high levels of heavy metals, which can be especially dangerous for young children, pregnant and nursing mothers, and other vulnerable groups. As part of the research, we spent months combing through dozens of websites where Brazilian government agencies are legally required to publish their procurement records. It was challenging work, hunting down droplets of relevant data cataloged with inconsistent search terms across multiple obscure portals. In this article, we’ll tell you how we went about it in hopes of inspiring and easing the way for other journalists and researchers to continue this line of inquiry. Because it was also richly rewarding: We uncovered 1,012 shark meat tenders issued since 2004, and identified 5,900 public institutions — preschools, homeless shelters, maternity wards, military bases, elderly care facilities, governor’s residences, and more — that potentially received shark meat as part of these procurements. (Brazil-based Mongabay reporters Karla Mendes and Fernanda Wenzel also played key roles in the investigation, following up leads on the ground turned up by our data work.) The impetus for…This article was originally published on Mongabay