Why It Seems Like There Are More Sharks Around The Jersey Shore

It might feel like you're hearing more about sharks in and around the Jersey Shore than you have in the past.

Beachgoers cleared the water earlier this month after a shark sighting. The OCEARCH Global Shark Tracker detected a great white shark July 2 about 10 miles off the coast of Cape May County. Several fishermen, including a 14-year-old, have caught sharks this summer off Long Beach Island.

But sharks aren't becoming more common in the area, according to OCEARCH founding chairman and expedition leader Chris Fischer. He says you're hearing about them more thanks to new methods of tracking them even when they're far off the coast.

"They've always been moving in and out of the beaches, going back millions of years," Fischer said. "Nothing's changed. We just know now."

The Jersey Shore, however, remains a "special" place for white sharks, Fischer said. North Atlantic white sharks commonly give birth and drop off their pups in the New York/New Jersey Bight from April through early June.

"They're born there in the spring and early summer, and they live there through the fall, and then they get out," Fischer said. "You're in a very special place."

The New York/New Jersey area appeals to white sharks for the same reason that many people enjoy it: there's plenty to eat. The population of menhaden — a foraging fish — has recovered in the last few years, Fischer said.

The menhaden emergence has inspired sharks and whales to spend time in the New York/New Jersey Bight, Fischer said. Overall, the area gives sharks plenty of menhaden, squid and mackerel to eat.

New Jersey's waters provide white sharks a place to birth and nurse pups, so you mostly see baby sharks approach the beaches. Once water gets cooler, they migrate down toward South Carolina, Fischer said.

But occasionally larger sharks like to pass through the New Jersey area, Fischer said.
"You'll have a few large sharks moving back into the area in that November, December timeframe when the sharks from Massachusetts and Atlantic Canada begin migrating south for the winter," he said.

Researchers don't know yet whether factors such as climate change have affected shark migration patterns. OCEARCH began tracking sharks in recent years, so they don't have enough data to make a judgment on whether their patterns have shifted.
That could change in the future.

"Our data will be used as a benchmark for someone 10 or 20 years from now to see if there has been a shift in their migrations due to climate change," Fischer said.

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