The young white shark brought to the Monterey Bay Aquarium on August 27 has now been released back into the wild after 11 days on exhibit. She was captured on August 16 in Santa Monica Bay and has now been safely returned to the same waters. During her stay at the Monterey Bay Aquarium she lived in their million-gallon Outer Bay exhibit, but despite her relatively roomy accommodation she only fed once and the staff decided that she would be better of in the wild.

A white shark

“These decisions are always governed by our concern for the health and well-being of these animals under our care,” says Jon Hoech, director of husbandry for the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

On September 7, the young female was released in offshore waters in the Santa Barbara Channel at 1:30 p.m. (Pacific Time). Before being released, she was tagged with a tracking device that will provide researchers with data on her life in the ocean. For 148 days, the pop-up tag will collect information about geographical location, depths, and water temperature. After this period, the tag will pop free and deliver the collected data via satellite.

As of now, a total of four White Sharks with tracking tags have been released from the Monterey Bay Aquarium. The three other sharks did however stay longer at the aquarium before going a back to the wild; between four and six months. Together with their research partners, the Monterey Bay Aquarium has tagged and tracked 18 juvenile white sharks off Southern California as a part of their “White Shark Conservation Research Project”. The aquarium is also involved in the project “Tagging of Pacific Predators” (TOPP) led by Stanford University’s Hopkins Marine Station, which has tracked 143 adult white sharks off the Central Coast using data-collecting tags.

If you wish to know more about the white shark research at the Monterey Bay Aquarium you can visit www.montereybayaquarium.org/whiteshark/.