Drifting Along with an Oceanic Whitetip Shark - Oct. 4, 2007

We began our day at VV buoy where the current was really ripping. There wasn't much going on there fishing-wise, so we concentrated on photography. We took some photos of the buoy, which was tilted over diagonally by the current. At SeaPics.com, we sometimes get photo requests for ocean currents, which is a difficult topic to illustrate. Today, though, we got some decent shots of water currents around the buoy, along with the brown booby resting on it.

After hanging around there for a while, we spotted an oceanic whitetip shark approaching the boat. Masa was eager to get some shots of this one, so despite the current, he jumped in. Predictably, he drifted well away from the boat without getting off much of a shot. I took the boat down to pick him up, and we went back to the buoy to try again. We ended up repeating this exercise about 10 or 12 times, trying to get off a shot of that shark.

The current was still pulling hard, and there was a lot of fishing line tangled on the buoy chain, stretched out horizontally by the tug of the current. Masa was a bit worried about getting tangled up in that stuff. Most days, when there's no current, the lines just dangle straight down, unnoticed, but today it was a diver trap.

By now, the oceanic whitetip had accumulated some nice rainbow runners and pilot fish. These fish are sometimes seen together with oceanic whitetips, and shots of them in a group are colorful and very marketable. Despite the current and the dangerous fishing lines, we kept at it. Masa urged me to get in the water on the grounds that I needed to witness this puppy face to face for my blog. I eventually got in, carrying a small bat with me.

Oceanic whitetips are large pelagic sharks and known to be aggressive. They like to approach fishing boats and grab whatever fish are being reeled in. When a diver's in the water, they'll come right up to bump their nose with the camera casing, or take a nibble of whatever limb is being offered up. I was hoping this one, a female, wasn't in a mood for contact. As it turned out, she stayed about 12 to 15 feet away, which suited me just fine. We checked each other out for a while and drifted apart.

I climbed out of the water, and Masa tried his luck again. We repeated our game of hide-and-seek with the shark, but the current never did cooperate, and we called it a day, with just some so-so pics of her. Too bad; that oceanic whitetip lost her chance to be a cover girl for SeaPics.com.

As we left the area, we saw some small skipjack jump out of the water. Boobies were flying all around, attracted by the baitfish schooling there. A dog on a nearby boat was barking like crazy, which made us laugh.

From there we went to C buoy. A small pod of pilot whales, probably juveniles, was out there, just a little too far away for any decent shots. We noticed a frigate bird circling, which is usually a sign of baitfish, which in turn attract the big fish and the dolphins. As expected, there were some pantropical spotted dolphins leaping around the baitfish. We got some excellent pics of airborne dolphins. They jumped so high, it was sometimes hard to keep the horizon line in the shot. There were also some big tuna out there, and I got off a nice shot of a leaping tuna. I say it jump once and held ready for the second jump, which I got. Nice work, me! After a good afternoon of dolphin photography, we took off for home. Some baby dolphins followed us and rolled around and around in our boat's wake.

By now, a huge dark cloud had descended on us. We wanted to reach port before it really started pouring, but just then we spotted a beaked whale break the surface! We cut the engine, and miraculously, that whale metamorphosized into a drifting log. Incredible, the things that happen at sea. Despite the impending downpour, we decided to fish the log. Driftwood tends to accumulate small fish, and before long, it's a complete environment. We had time to catch a small striped wahoo, and then headed back to the Keauhou marina. We were drenched from the rain, but I had no time to change or even dry off, as it was my turn to carpool for my daughter's gymnastics group. No time to help Masa clean out the boat either; maybe next week!

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All pix from today's excursion!



Links to stock photos of species mentioned in today's blog (please be patient!-10 seconds to load):


oceanic whitetip sharks
pantropical spotted dolphins
pilot whales