Tag Archives: jaws

Great White Sharks

The Truth About “Jaws”, It’s Making & Shark Persecution

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Beneath the surface of Hollywood’s most iconic ocean thriller lies a deeper, darker truth. In this chilling episode, we venture into the murky waters behind the making of Jaws—a film that forever altered our perception of the sea and its apex predator. But the terror didn’t end on screen.

We dive into real-life great white shark attacks that fueled the public’s fear and expose how Steven Spielberg’s cinematic masterpiece led to shark persecution but also inspired some to take up shark conservation. From behind-the-scenes chaos and mechanical monsters to blood-soaked beaches and misunderstood killers, this is the untold story of fear, fiction, and fallout.

Listen to a fun episode of Dark Outdoors on the real story behind Jaws that you have never heard.

Listen and subscribe here on your favorite podcast platforms.

Strange New Gene Editing Case

In a bold new step for aquaculture, scientists at Auburn University have created a genetically modified catfish containing an alligator gene—not to grow scales or teeth, but to fight disease. Using CRISPR gene-editing, researchers inserted the cathelicidin gene, which helps alligators resist infections, into channel catfish embryos. The modified fish also carry a sterility switch, ensuring they can’t breed in the wild.

The goal? Combat the major issue of aquatic disease that leads to billions in losses globally. In tests, the hybrid catfish had up to five times higher survival rates against bacterial infections compared to normal stock.

The technology is still under review for commercial use, but its implications are vast: fewer antibiotics, higher yield, and built-in ecological safeguards.

Higher Calling Wildlife® is closely following this emerging space, particularly after receiving recent awards for investigative reporting on wildlife cloning—including the controversial case of the cloned Marco Polo sheep. With conservation, biotech, and law intersecting in unexpected ways, these stories are only beginning to unfold.

Chester Moore

Chester Moore

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Sharks

Easter Sharks Book Giveaway & “Jaws”

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Happy Easter!

Today me and my family celebrate the basis of our faith—the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In celebration of HIs giving, I would like to give something to you!

I just released a podcast on the true story of the shark attacks that inspired “Jaws” on Dark Outdoors®. You can listen and subscribe here on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Iheartradio & Audible.

I would really appreciate you listening to this episode and we’re closing to breaking my all-time one week download record.

You can also listen here directly through Podbean.

So, I want to give three awesome books on sharks to the first three people that email me at chester@chestermoore.com and put “sharks” in the subject line.

PS: If you listened to the episode let me know what you thought. It was a fun one to put together. Learn more about sharks at my other blog Gulf Great White Sharks.

Chester Moore

Follow Chester Moore and Higher Calling Wildlife® on the following social media platforms

To support the efforts of Higher Calling Wildlife® click here.

Subscribe to the Dark Outdoors podcast on all major podcasting platforms.

@thechestermoore on Instagram

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Email Chester at chester@chestermoore.com.

Gulf of Mexico

Great White Off The Texas and Florida Coasts

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Did you know great white sharks are returning to the Gulf of Mexico in a big way?

We talk about a case of a great white off the Texas Coast a few years back as well as dig into the reason white sharks are returning to Gulf waters in the latest episode of Higher Calling Wildlife on YouTube.

New Great White Sharks Blog

I’m super excited to debut my new blog that’s all about great white sharks in the Gulf of Mexico. It’s over at www.gulfgreatwhites.com.

It’s the place to get up to date info on the return of great white sharks in the Gulf of Mexico as well as covering other large sharks in Gulf waters such as makos, porbeagles, tigers and bulls.

Follow Chester Moore and Higher Calling Wildlife® on the following social media platforms

@thechestermoore on Instagram

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Email Chester at chester@chestermoore.com.

Subscribe to the Dark Outdoors and Higher Calling Wildlife podcasts on all major podcasting platforms.

Great White Sharks, Great White University

Great White Shark Shows Up South of New Orleans

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A 14 foot, 2.600 pound great white shark has showed up south of New Orleans, La. just a few miles away from the South Pass area.

“LeeBeth”, was fitted with an Atlantic White Shark Conservancy satellite tag by Capt. Chip Michalove off the coast of South Carolina Dec. 8, 2023.

Since then this massive shark has taken an epic trip from the Atlantic to near the Texas/Mexico border at South Padre Island to the Texas/Louisiana border south of Sabine Pass and now in the Mississippi River Delta region.

*Scroll down to read about exclusive reports from the Chandeleur Islands!

“LeeBeth” photo courtesy Capt. Chip Michalove.

Leebeth pinged, which means she breached the surface where a satellite could pick up the signal 8:15 a.m. Friday March 15.

She is not the only great white that has visited the area this year.

“Crystal” and “Keji”, both great whites tagged by research group Ocearch showed up in the same general area in January.

The idea of great white sharks in the Gulf of Mexico might seem strange but it is part of their native range.

Leebeth’s last ping at the time of this writing. Download the Sharktivity app from the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy to keep up with her movements.

Harvest regulation changes in the 1990s have allowed more of these sharks to reach maturity and venture from the Atlantic where researchers believe they are born and enter the Gulf.

NOAA has some extremely interesting older data on great whites in the Gulf of Mexico. Their earliest recorded white shark I could find was off the coast of Sarasota, Fla. on a set line in the winter of 1937. Another specimen was caught in the same area in 1943.

In February 1965, a female was captured in a net intended for bottlenose dolphins at Mullet Key near St. Petersburg. In addition, National Marine Fisheries Service officials reported 35 great whites as bycatch in the Japanese longline fishery in the Gulf from 1979 through 1982.

In the 1963 book Shadows In the Sea; Sharks, Skates & Rays, the presence of great whites in Texas waters as far back as the 1950s is mentioned.

A great white shark seven feet long was caught in 15 fathoms, 12 miles off of Port Aransas, TX  on Feb. 9, 1950. Seven days later, a second great white 11 feet, 4-inches long was caught in the same area. And 10 days later, a third, this one 12 feet, 2 inches long, was caught there. Yet, there has never been a previously reported catches in Texas waters.

Interestingly, the story we did on the whites shark at Sabine Pass inspired two fishermen to report seeing great whites in the Chandeleur Islands which are very close to where LeeBeth and the other great whites pinged.

“I was wade fishing the Chandeleur Islands in 2006 in the aftermarth of Hurricane Katrina. The storm had washed away a bunch of mangrove in the surf but left little islands big enough to climb up on and stand in the surf which left about four to six feet of water beneath these little clumps.”

“So I’m standing on one and saw what I believed to be a great white the size of a Cadillac swim right in front of my little island. When I told the story to the guys I was with nobody believed me and convinced me I saw a big tiger shark. I’m pretty sure after these revelations I was right.”

Another angler reported seeing a white in the Chandeleur Islandes the same year.

“I saw one while wade fishing the Chandeleur Islands about a year after Katrina. It was right after I got back in the boat and it swam right by the boat about 10 feet off our starboard beam in about eight feet of water. It was shocking to say the least.”

These reports at this point while very credible are considered only anecdotal from a research perspective.

However, if white shark tagging research has shown us anything, it is angler stories of great whites from the past seem far more likely to be accurate now since we know without question, these magnificent sharks inhabit the Gulf.

Chester Moore

Acadiana Boat, Sport & RV Show

Mark your calendars for the Acadiana Boat, Sport & RV Show. Connect with everything from new boats to fish equipment and guided fishing trips. Check it out at Evangeline Downs Racetrack & Casino March 22-24.

Follow Chester Moore and Higher Calling Wildlife® on the following social media platforms

@thechestermoore on Instagram

Chester Moore’s YouTube.

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Email Chester at chester@chestermoore.com.

Subscribe to the Dark Outdoors and Higher Calling Wildlife podcasts on all major podcasting platforms.

Gulf of Mexico

Has “Mr. Ed” Has Killed More People Than “Jaws”?

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With “Shark Week” about to kick off, I thought it was timely to send out a post to give you some information you have to dig really deep to find.

I commend Discovery for their amazing shark coverage but you can only do so much on television in a week. The following information ranges from the esoteric to the criminally underreported.

Horse Vs. Shark

Sounds like a Syfy Original doesn’t it?

In reality I am talking statistics and according to the Centers for Disease Control sharks kill about one person in the United States annually. Horses kill around 20.

That won’t grab too many headlines because too many media figures and wealthy, influential people have horses but it is a fact.

Sharks are easy to sensationalize but in reality Mr. Ed’s kind has killed far more people than “Jaws”and its family in the United States.

Sashimi Specialist

Raw salmon with a splash of soy sauce and a bit of wasabi is one of my favorite food items. Raw salmon is also a favorite of a virtually unknown close cousin of the great white shark-the aptly named salmon shark.

Salmon_shark_nmfs
Salmon shark fitted with a tag. Photo courtesy National Marine Fisheries Service.

This shark dwells the waters of the northern Pacific and is a fairly common catch on Alaskan fishing vessels.

From the article Hot Blooded Predator in Alaska Fish & Wildlife News.

Ferocious fighters and fast swimmers, the salmon shark is a close cousin to the great white shark. The salmon shark, Lamna ditropis, belongs family Lamnidae with four other species: the great white shark, the shortfin and longfin mako sharks, and the salmon shark’s Atlantic counterpart, the porbeagle (or mackerel) shark.

According to The Conservation Institute these sharks are not only warm-blooded but super fast.

Salmon sharks (Lamna ditropis) are large, powerful, warm-bodied (endothermic), and streamlined predators adapted for high-speed swimming. Reports from the U.S. Navy have clocked salmon sharks exceeding 50 knots.

This would make the salmon shark one of the fastest fish in the ocean. They are reported to reach 11.9 feet (3.6 m) in total length (Eschmeyer et al. 1983, Compagno 1984). Most of the salmon sharks encountered in Alaskan waters (the northeastern Pacific) are surprisingly uniform: over 93% are females ranging from 6 1/2 to 8 feet (2 – 2.5 m) in length and roughly 300 pounds (136 kg). Salmon sharks in the 700 pound range have been reported by sport fishermen in Alaska.

These sharks are fascinating creatures that rarely come across swimmers or divers and strike fear only into the hearts of sockeye and chinook.

Underrated Biter

The common blacktip shark is never listed in Internet and television lists of the most dangerous sharks.

Yet as we reported in recent weeks if you look at the raw numbers from the International Shark Attack File (ISAF), you will see they should be.

While blacktips were only positively identified in one unprovoked fatality they were responsible for 29 total attacks.

chester shark 2.jpg
The author with a huge blacktip shark caught and released off the coast of Venice, La.

That puts only the great white, tiger and bull-the three species everyone recognizes as potentially dangerous above them. We wrote about this last year here but have some new insight.

ISAF has a category for requiem and lamniforems-attacks linked to those branches but not to exact species and those are both higher than the blacktip. But when it comes to identified sharks biting people blacktips rank fourth.

Period.

This is not to implicate the blacktip as a creature to be feared. It is however to question some of the shark attacks identified as bull and to  lesser extent spinner sharks (which have 16 attacks attribute to them.)

Spinner sharks are nearly identical to blacktips and bull sharks and big blacktips can appear similar especially in murky water.

It’s an interesting thing to consider as millions of beachcombers, wade fishermen and divers hit coastal waters.

That’s it for now. Expect much more to come on sharks over the coming two weeks.

Chester Moore, Jr.

(To contact Chester Moore e-mail chester@chestermoore.com. To subscribe to this blog enter your email address in the box on the top right of this page.)