First basking shark of the year spotted in Scottish waters

Abasking shark has been spotted in Scottish waters for the first time this year.

The lone shark was seen in the Hebrides near to Canna and was reported to the Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust (HWDT).

It was spotted by Canna Lighthouse technician William Beedie and is the first sighting in Scottish waters this year.

Basking sharks have already been spotted off Ireland and England, and they will be a more common sight on the west coast in the coming months.

Pippa Garrard, education manager at HWDT, explained that the basking sharks are one of the most commonly seen marine megafauna in Scotland.

She said: “Generally we receive 150 to 200 sightings of basking sharks per year and they are within the top 5 species reported and these mostly come from the public from ferries and on boats.

“We tend to have one or two sightings of basking sharks a year in April, that is when our first shark will turn up, so it is quite early as we usually see them in the last week of April but it’s not too unusual.

“It’s usually just one individual as well, sightings will start to increase through May, and the busy peak season is between July and September.

“We once recorded more than 50 sharks in a day which was incredible from our research vessel on the west coast near Tiree and Coll back in 2019.

“They don’t come up to the surface to breathe so you can easily tell them apart from whales and dolphins, they can just swim along at the surface for long periods of time, which makes it great for people to be able to spot them and they have these huge triangular fins that you can see out of the water.

“We call them gentle giants.”

A basking shark is the second largest fish in the world and lives for up to 50 years. They are up to 8 metres long and come to Scotland to feed on plankton.

Basking sharks swim with their mouths open to take in water and plankton which filters out of their gills.

They can eat 25kg of plankton in an hour.

The HWDT is a marine conservation charity that maintain a community sightings datasbase of more than 28,000 marine mammal and megafauna sightings for the west coast of Scotland dating back to 1992.

They receive between 3,000 and 6,000 sightings a year from the public and wildlife watching operators and businesses.

They have an app called Whale Track that you can use to record sightings onthe-go, with a community of more than 2,000 people.

GENTLE GIANTS: Harmless basking sharks are up to 8 metres long and feed on plankton in the seas around the UK.