The "baddest" shark at Isla Guadalupe?

I want to introduce you to some of the sharks we have met over the last 14 years at Guadalupe Island.
Thanks to the Photo Id project we are able to individually identify the sharks and keep track of who's visiting the Island each year. We are now at over 155 different sharks, some of them having been seen at Guadalupe every years, since we started going there in 2001.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the ID project here and now I want to start out by introducing you to the guy who got me hooked on shark diving.

"Shredder"

"Shredder" was one of the real characters at Guadalupe Island. Never the most careful shark, he definitely kept us entertained an on our toes. Most divers recognized him by his shredded dorsal fin. While some called him "Scar" and others "Cal Ripfin", to me, he has always been "Shredder". Most people think that he got his name because of his "shredded" dorsal fin. That is actually not the case. He got his name a few years before he "shredded" his fin. On the very first trip to Guadalupe Island one of the divers went up to the captain of the "Horizon" and told him "A shark just bit through your anchor line". Knowing how thick the anchor line is, the captain doubted that the shark bit all the way through it and went to the bow, to check things out. There were indeed just a few feet of anchor line dangling over the  rail and just as he got there a shark jumped up, trying to get the rest. .... that is how "Shredder" got his name, he shredded the anchor line.

"Shredder's unique dorsal fin"

Biting anchor lines were not the only thing he was famous for. He loved showing off for our divers. On one particular day, he kept swimming back and forth, just inches from the cages for 7 solid hours. It was during a day, where we couldn't put any attractant or baits into the water. That didn't stop him from checking out our divers all day long.  Swimming by the cages, looking each diver in the eyes, the exactly how he got me hooked on shark diving.

Hi I'm Shredder!

 Another thing that made "Shredder" unique was the fact that he didn't seem to have gotten the memo that great white sharks have a hierarchy based on size. Normally, the smaller sharks defers to the bigger ones, but not Shredder. He was definitely not intimidated by anyone.

Shredder with Dr. "Mau"

He was also a shark that loved to breach! I have seen him do that at least 5 or 6 times.

"Shredder" was at Guadalupe Island from 2001 to 2012 and hasn't been seen since then. I don't know what happened to him. Maybe he got caught by a fishing boat, maybe he didn't defer to a bigger shark and died. I prefer to think that he's still out there, swimming in the vast oceans and will return some day. It's not unprecedented that a shark stays away from Guadalupe for years at a time. We had one show up after an absence of 8 years.


If you want to come out with us and see if "Shredder" returns this season, call us at 855.987.4275 or visit http://www.sharkdiver.com//bookings/

Let's go shark diving!

Cheers,
Martin Graf
CEO Shark Diver

About Shark Diver. As a global leader in commercial shark diving and conservation initiatives Shark Diver has spent the past decade engaged for sharks around the world. Our blog highlights all aspects of both of these dynamic and shifting worlds. You can reach us directly at staff@sharkdiver.com.

Guadalupe Shark Alert - Shredder Back for Season Nine!

With his distinctive dorsal fin and well known cage diver curiosity Shredder has thrilled divers from around the world for the past nine years.

We named this iconic shark Shredder back in 2003 in an incident that defined this remarkably animal in more ways than one.

See How Shredder Got His Name.

The good news is that our beloved shark is back this week once again thrilling divers after his 2000 mile migration into the deep Pacific and back to Isla Guadalupe.

We are always on the look out for this special and endearing animal and each season when we do not see him in the first pulse of sharks with characters like Bruce we wait with growing concern.

For our divers who have been asking about Shredder this year, he's back and bigger than ever, great news!

Let's go shark diving!

How Shredder Got His Name - Guadalupe Island

Known by a few names, Shredder has lived up to the name the crew of SharkDiver.com gave him at the start of the 2003 shark diving season back in the day when we chummed with real beef blood and divers fished for, but rarely landed, whole tuna.

Our very first white shark encounter in 2003 was with a 12 foot male white shark complete with “shredded” dorsal fin and several deep bite marks on his head.

He came in fast from the left, our first sight was of his mangled dorsal fin slicing through the surface toward our hang baits (tuna), he hit the first one with an unexpected fury, then turned and zeroed in on the second hang bait missing it and disappearing into the blue distance. This was clearly a unique animal and at the end of the day we named him "Shredder," little did we know he would more than own that new name.

Shredder Takes a Bite

I was up in the wheelhouse with our boats captain (Greg) during the last dive of our last day at Isla Guadalupe. It had been an amazing expedition thus far and our shark cages were loaded for the last time with die hard shark divers. At the time three new sharks in the 10-13 foot class were entertaining them. Two divers not in cage rotation, Kevin and Matt, were fishing for “last chance” tuna on the bow of our 88-foot dive boat the Ocean Odyssey when our crew in the wheelhouse heard a large splash. Seconds later a startled voice called up to us, “Umm, hey, a shark just blasted up and severed the anchor cable from our boat,” that was Matt, one look into his face I knew he was speaking the truth.

Our ships captain was not so sure, saying “that’s a rated 20,000 pound poly-pro anchor cable, there’s no way a shark just bit through it.”. One of the ships crew was summoned forward to have a look and sure enough came up with the last 5 feet of cable ending in one very messy shredded fray. A 12 foot great white shark had just leapt up almost 10 feet clear out of the water and bit through our anchor cable, about the size of a mans wrist and designed to hold an 88 foot dive boat in place in even the roughest weather conditions!

We were now adrift with shark cages fully deployed, sharks in the water and one shark the (newly named Shredder) with a new taste for anchor cables. In the history of shark diving I doubt this has ever happened to another dive boat. Crew raced forward and aft, we had our shark divers calmly exit the cages (30 minutes early) pulling them from the water in record time. In exactly 20 minutes we had the ship squared away and ready to get under power. Once we had settled down our divers were thrilled. After all you cannot call it a "shark expedition” until a shark chews through your anchor cable!

That's how Shredder got his name. He's now much bigger in the 14-15 foot class and still an icon of Isla Guadalupe, Mexico. His sat tags have revealed he is a regular visitor to Hawaii's North Shore when he is not thrilling divers at Isla Guadalupe, Mexico.