Gather round friends as I'll tell you a tale of a close encounter, that I witnessed with my very own eyes!! And caught the action on my trusty camera
between a southern giant petrel and a great white shark!
We sailed the seas in South Australia all the way to the Neptune island in search of the oceans Apex predator..... THE GREAT WHITE SHARK 🦈 🦈
As we arrived to the Neptune Islands we started a berley trail to entice the beast to the boat.
The water was bubbling up from the trevally and kingfish snacking on the berley off cuts.
This berley trail caught the attention of the feathered variety aswell.
Before long seagulls appeared to see what all the fuss was about.
Some of them even landed on the boat for a rest.
Then these really big gulls flew over the top and circled the boat for a bit.
Off in the distance I spotted something black on top of the water. At first I thought it was a shark fin sticking out of the water.
But as it came closer bobbing a long on top of the water I noticed it was a southern giant petrel.
Now these birds are like Jesus as they can walk/run on water haha.
When they take off from the water to fly they start to run across the water until they get airborne as the sheer size of these birds takes a lot of effort to leave the water. It's lots of fun to watch!
The Southern giant petrel weighs in around 3.6 kg and some even grow up to 99cm with a 205cm wingspan. These guys are really big birds hence the name southern giant petrel.
Now I was watching these two petrels just hanging out. Everything seemed fine but then a fight broke out between the two.
They were both really not happy. Maybe one said something that the other didn't agree with. But we could speculate all day what kicked off this epic battle on top of the water. It was like they were fighting for the giant petrel belt in the ultimate bird fighting championship. Id say this was the heavy weight division.
Then all of a sudden I could see this huge dark shadow beneath the water while these two birds were distracted fighting between each other.
Then out of nowhere a great white shark broke the water looking for an easy snack just floating above. Or was he the moderator trying to break up the fight?
Either way this definitely got the attention of the two birds as on quickly popped up into the air from the force of the water of the shark, then started to run away on top of the water while the other petrel bobbed out of the way with the swell of the water from the huge shark breaching.
Just like a professional boxer dodging a over hand right.
It was amazing to see a great white try and take advantage of a possible bird lunch.
Who would have thought hey.