Shark Mark Photography

07/05/2021

Happy 4th. Enjoy some backyard red white and blue.

05/10/2021

12/30/2018

Shark Mark Photography has a cameo in the Aquaman movie! For those of you planning to see it, keep an eye out for the face of this beautiful manta from the Kona coast of the Big Island. Hint: it’s small but you’ll see it next to the face of another “Manta” in the film. Double hint: like any superhero movie, stay through the credits.

03/04/2018

Moli, the Laysan ablatross, nesting at Kaena Point, Oahu. These seabirds with enormous wingspans, some nearing 7ft wide, can spend months or even years out over the open ocean without ever touching land. These birds are long-lived and and form life-long breeding pairs. After spending months or years at sea, pairs will meet at the same breeding ground. Following an elaborate dance after-reuniting, the pair will take turns incubating a single egg . When the chick hatches, the parents will take turns foraging out at sea, returning with food for their offspring.

Laysan albatross are a conservation success story. Kaena point is one of the few places left on the main Hawaiian islands for these seabirds to nest. Decades of hard work and conservation measures have provided the protection needed to maintain this area as a viable breeding ground for this species.

10/22/2017

Shelter is a hot commodity when you're a small fish in a big ocean. This barrel was floating more than a dozen miles offshore, but some of the fish you see here such as the mamo (seargant majors) and nenue (Hawaiian chub) you'll usually see swimming around shallow coral reefs. Though not a natural object, this debris has provided shelter for these small fish. Major derbis can sometimes carry non-native or invasive species to remote areas- or pose as entanglement hazards, such as discarded fishing nets and lines.

10/22/2017

Checkout the SharkTagger.org page and website to learn more about ongoing studies on pelagic sharks around Hawai'i, including the Oceanic Whitetip, and how working with local Hawai'i fishermen will help us learn more about their behavior and conserve their population.

0 Likes, 1 Comments - SharkTagger () on Instagram: “Have you seen me? We're out to tag Oceanic Whitetips in Hawaii to learn more about their movement…”

07/30/2017

Great article from the NOAA Fisheries website about the pelagic shark research scientists from NOAA and the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology are conducting around Hawaii. Learn more about the underlying questions on shark populations we addressing through scientific research, how new advances in tagging technology will allow us to learn more about sharks and their environment, and how we are engaging with the local fishing community. Contains footage of a bigeye thresher that was tagged off Kona in 2016.

03/17/2017

Hereʻs some green for your St. Patrickʻs Day. A juvenile mako shark swimming around our green light (which looks like a lightsaber) off the Kona coast, Hawaiʻi Island.

03/17/2017

Oceanic whitetip shark, Carcharhinus longimanus, off the Kona coast of Hawaiʻi Island. These sharks are found in offshore tropical or warm-temperate waters around the world. They often travel with pods of short-finnned pilot whales, as this individual was. Once and not so long ago, these sharks were considered one of the most abundant large animals in the ocean. But global pressures from shark finning and large-scale fishing bycatch have decimated many of their populations worldwide, and their populations are projected to decrease. Research efforts are underway to gather important information on their movements and population dynamics.
Thanks to Wild Hawaii Ocean Adventures for bringing us to the shark.

01/05/2016

The Hawaiian bobtail squid, Euprymna scolopes, found only in the Hawaiian archipeligo, can be seen emerging at night in shallow coastal shores to feed on tiny shrimp at night. During the day they lay buried in the sediment. Adults are about the size of a walnut, growing no more than 2 inches long. The beautiful iridescence comes from a light emitting organ that is filled with the bacteria Vibrio fisheri. This light-producing symbiotic bacteria allows for the squid to counter-illuminate their body to match the ambient moonlight, allowing them to avoid detection from their predators and prey alike. Newly hatched bobtail squid are not born with this bacteria. Each bobtail squid must acquire or cultivate this bacteria from it's environment. Adults expel 95% of their bacteria every dawn. The mechanism of how their immune cells are able to specifically select and incorporate this beneficial bacteria but reject potentially harmful bacteria from the environment is unknown.

05/20/2015

The beautiful Redmargin Spanish dancer, Hexabranchus pulchellus. The largest nudibranch found in Hawaii, this one was about 9 inches in length. When crawling along the reef, the parapodia- the long extensions off the body mantel, are curled up along the body. It is a brilliant display when the Spanish dancer swims through the water, unfurling it's bright red parapodia and moving them in a graceful undulatory motion. This individual was photographed at night at the steps of the boat lagoon at Coconut Island in Kaneohe Bay.