the 26-second clip on Facebook<\/a> on Sunday, garnering thousands of \u201clikes\u201d and hundreds of shares in the days since it was posted.<\/p>\nIn the footage, the shark can be seen close up, swimming past bait set by the institute. The video system is deployed about 10 times a season, similar to a lobster trap, and relies on a GoPro camera to capture the action in six-hour intervals, according to Dodd.<\/p>\n
In the four years since the institute began using the system, it\u2019s picked up images of tuna, sea turtles, and a host of other kinds of sharks, but never an encounter with a great white, Dodd said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was really, really exciting to kind of finally look and say, \u2018That is a great white,\u201d Dodd said. \u201cIt was really special.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the institute, great white sharks can be elusive and have a smaller population compared to other shark species in the local waters of the Atlantic Ocean.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t have the large white sharks, the subadults and adults, in Rhode Island,\u201d Dodd said. \u201cThose white sharks will cruise through at different parts of the season, typically earlier, May, June, maybe into July. They\u2019re heading north. They\u2019re heading up towards the Cape and in Maine and Canada to feed on seals. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the small ones that stick around,\u201d Dodd added. \u201cWe\u2019re seeing a greater propensity for the small ones to stick around Rhode Island because it\u2019s a little safer for them … because these other large sharks will attack them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Part of what makes the sighting interesting is that this particular shark caught on camera \u201cwas likely never seen before\u201d and \u201cmay never be seen again,\u201d Dodd said.<\/p>\n
Female great white sharks are not able to reproduce until after the age of 30, he said. This shark may not become a mother until close to 2060, if she survives.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe get a glimpse, a very quick glimpse, into her life as a young shark trying to feed, survive, and stay away from predators and hopefully do it for decade after decade after decade, so she can replace herself,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Christopher Gavin can be reached at christopher.gavin@globe.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"So, when a female juvenile great white shark graced the lens of the institute\u2019s baited remote underwater video…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":192934,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":{"0":"post-192933","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192933"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192933\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/192934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}