Maine researchers have tagged an 8-foot juvenile white shark, their first, as part of a new effort to better understand how young white sharks use the Gulf of Maine, the Maine Department of Marine Resources said Friday.
The female shark, named “Bug” by DMR lead shark researcher Matt Davis, was tagged Wednesday night by Davis and University of Maine Associate Professor of Marine Science Walt Golet. The shark’s capture comes amid a shark-spotting frenzy in Maine waters this summer, including numerous sightings and an encounter in which a Scarborough lifeguard was pulled underwater by a white shark.
The research is part of two projects being conducted this year by DMR, UMaine and the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Researchers are seeing more juvenile white sharks in coastal Maine and want to study their presence, distribution and habitat use in the Gulf of Maine, Davis said.
“While hundreds of white sharks have been tagged in New England waters, very few have been tagged in Maine waters,” Davis said. “Additionally, juvenile white sharks less than 9 feet in length are relatively under-represented in the tagged population.”
Since the two research projects began in August, researchers have tagged three white sharks in total. The other two were tagged through a shore-based project led by University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Biology Professor Diego Bernal.
The boat-based research is being conducted between York Beach and Boothbay Harbor, with Davis and Golet planning to tag up to 10 juvenile white sharks from research vessels this year.
DMR has monitored white shark activity in the Gulf of Maine since 2020 using acoustic telemetry receivers that detect tagged sharks. The department now has more than 35 receiver sites between Ogunquit Beach and the U.S.-Canadian border.
The second project is being conducted from shore at night on southern Maine beaches. Bernal’s team can tag up to 30 white sharks landed on baited hooks.
The projects are authorized under special licenses issued by DMR. The tags used for the DMR and UMaine research were funded through a grant from the Maine Outdoor Heritage Fund.