The great white shark is truly special, and its mystique has only elevated with this piece of news.
When it comes to the ocean’s apex predators and the apex predators of the entire animal kingdom, great white sharks are some of the most notable. But there’s still a lot of mystery surrounding the legendary species — like it being born.
Think about it: Have you ever seen a newborn great white shark?
Neither has anybody else, until now.
For the first time in history, an infant great white shark has been caught on camera just hours following its birth.
GANSBAAI, SOUTH AFRICA – OCTOBER 19: A Great White Shark is attracted by a lure on the ‘Shark Lady Adventure Tour’ on October 19, 2009 in Gansbaai, South Africa. The lure, usually a tuna head, is attached to a buoy and thrown into the water in front of the cage with the divers. The waters off Gansbaai are the best place in the world to see Great White Sharks, due to the abundance of prey such as seals and penguins which live and breed on Dyer Island, which lies 8km from the mainland. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)
A Great White shark jumps out of the water as it hunts Cape fur seals near False Bay, on July 4, 2010. (Photo: CARL DE SOUZA/AFP via Getty Images)
A Great White shark jumps out of the water as it bites a fake decoy seal near False Bay, in this July 4, 2010 file photo. At least two Great White sharks have been spotted near a beach in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, in July 2012 causing anxiety and excitement among tourist and locals. The sharks, one measuring nearly five meters, were spotted on July 3, reports the website Capecodsharkhunters.com. Media reports conclude that the increase in the seal population in the area has attracted the sharks. (Photo: CARL DE SOUZA/AFP/GettyImages)
Seals hang out and bask in the sandbars off the shore of Cape Cod, Massachusetts on July 13, 2019. – The seal population off of Cape Cod has risen to numbers in the tens of thousands, since the creation of Marine Mammal Protection Act, possibly more than 50,000, which has created an abundant food source for the Great White shark, an apex predator that feeds off of seals. (Photo by JOSEPH PREZIOSO/AFP via Getty Images)
Carlos Gauna, a wildlife photographer and videographer, has been going out to the ocean for years, spending hours each session getting film on sharks, which he labels an attempt to reveal “the secret lives of sharks.” (RELATED: New Footage Of 10-Year-Old Boy Attacked By Shark In Bahamas Shows Blood Filling Up Tank In Absolutely Horrifying Scene)
Well, Gauna was in Santa Barbara last summer (July 9), already observing sharks in the area for three years at that point, when he noticed that there was a gathering of “really large sharks.”
Gauna thought the reason may have been because they were giving birth, and come to find out, that’s exactly what happened. Using his drone, both he and his partner — University of California, Riverside, biology doctoral student Phillip Sternes — “observed a big, big shark go down” underwater.
“Just a few minutes later, this little bitty thing comes up from that spot,” Gauna told CBS News. “… It was tiny — really, really small compared to all the other sharks. I think Phil’s words were, ‘Oh my God, I think that might be a newborn.'”
“There have been dead white sharks found inside deceased pregnant mothers. But nothing like this.” Gauna added in a press release.
First-ever image of a newborn great white shark revealed https://t.co/AfNPy1bYNH
— Newsweek (@Newsweek) January 29, 2024
The great white shark … truly legendary.