Tagging whale sharks

Tagging efforts on behalf of the CONANP are taking place in order to estimate population size and identify its migratory routs.

The tag is a piece of yellow plastic, with a large progressive number and the web address to register a sighting, which we place about ten or twenty centimeters below the base of the dorsal fin, of the left side of the animal.

We also placed satellite tags, one in 2003 and two in 2004, that looks like a 15 cm microphone that stores information and sends it via satellite. If you see an animal that has one, please cut the strand that binds it to the shark’s body, as close to the tag as you can, and let us know. It contains valuable information about its migration routes and behavior, as well as the depth at which it has been moving during the period it has been tagged. 

In the 2003 season, 17 animals were marks with tags from the Mote Marine Institute. By 2004 we marked 173 with CONANP tags, which in addition have the project’s name (PROYECTO DOMINO) and the word “MEXICO”, so that people in who see it in the other countries know where it has been tagged. Just imagine how many whale sharks visit to us that in a two day period, some DOMINO team members: Rafael of the Parra, Hitamar Palm, Jose Antele and Paco Remolina, tagged 36 sharks.

If you see a tagged shark, please send us the location were you spotted it, with the geographic location at the time of the sighting. If you can, take a picture, since each one has a different pattern and we are making a photo library to identify them.

In October of 2003 we received a report of a marked shark, in Utila, Honduras, three months after we tagged it.

If you see some skin injury, caused by the small wound made when tagging them, please photograph it and send us a picture.