Prior to Westgate’s research, very little was known about basking shark movements, but with this research we are getting a clearer picture of where this species travels throughout the year. From mid-October to early November, the basking shark leaves the Bay of Fundy and the Gulf of Maine waters and moves south east towards the Sargasso and Caribbean seas. This information was truly significant for conservation as most Canadian lobster gear is deployed after most of the basking sharks have left our waters, thereby reducing the risk of entanglement in ground lines. Over the course of his research, Westgate was able to collect 1840 days of data that tracked the movement of these sharks. Using satellite tags, they tracked 10 sharks over the course of 2011 and 2012; the tags were particularly designed for fish like sharks which don’t spend enough time on the surface to allow the use of real-time satellite tags. These particular tags collected data while attached to the shark and popped off in time, floating to the surface, where the data was then picked up by a satellite and transmitted to researchers. During the course of his research, they were able to document some of the deepest dives ever recorded from basking sharks (1460 metres and 1600 metres).
