Fin-credible

SHOCKING TOOTH ABOUT BASKING SHARKS

JUST when you thought it was safe to go back in the water … along comes a shark that thinks it’s Jaws.

But these basking sharks are looking for plankton, not people, around the west coast of Scotland.

Just as well – the water’s freezing.

ONE feeds on plankton and the other is a fearsome man eater. But it has now emerged that Britain’s biggest fish is a match for Jaws. A team of scientists have discovered basking sharks can jump as fast and as high out of water as great whites. The researchers said the plankton-eating sharks had a reputation for being slow, while their cousin was powerful. In their study, scientists recorded a basking shark achieve a top speed of 5.1m/s.

Other research has suggested the sharks likely breach – leap from the water – while feeding.

Every summer, basking sharks gather in large numbers around small islands between Skye and Mull, off Scotland’s west coast.

They later migrate south to waters around Madeira and the Canary Islands off west Africa. The research was led by Queen’s University Belfast and London’s University of Roehampton and published in the Journal Biology Letters.

Dr Jonathan Houghton, senior lecturer in marine biology from the School of Biological Sciences at Queen’s, said: “This finding shows there is far more to these sharks than the huge swimming sieves we are so familiar with. It’s like discovering cows are as fast as wolves – when you’re not looking.”