Expert to discuss life, history of white sharks

WASHINGTON — The Gunn Memorial Library will present a program with Dr. Michael Domeier at 4 p.m. June 16.

Dr. Michael Domeier's decades long research on the life history of white sharks has helped completely rewrite what scientists thought they knew about this species. Guests will learn about how his project combined new satellite tagging technology with much more basic tools, like cameras, to describe where these sharks mate, give birth, and everything in between. His method of identifying individual sharks via photographs has allowed him to determine whether the population of

Great Whites is going up or going down off the west coast.

According to a statement, Dr. Domeier grew up in Falls Village and is an HVRHS graduate. . If he wasn't fishing in the Hollenbeck River, which ran through his family's property, he was fiddling with the four aquariums in his bedroom.

After graduating from Housatonic Valley Regional High School, his fascination with coral reef fishes led him to Florida, where he eventually earned his Ph.D. in marine biology and fisheries from University of Miami. After a post-doc studying the spawning behavior of coral reef fishes, he migrated to southern California to lead the marine sport fish research project for the state of California.

After a few years he founded a non-profit marine research laboratory and began studying large pelagic fishes, using state of the art electronic tagging technology.

While on an expedition to study large Bluefin Tuna at a remote island off the coast of Mexico, he discovered an unusually large number of adult Great White Sharks. Without a Bluefin in sight, Dr. Domeier decided to deploy one of his satellite tags onto a Great White Shark. That was the beginning of a 20-plus year research project that has completely redefined what the world knows about this fascinating species.

His research has resulted in many peer-reviewed scientific papers and many television programs on networks like National Geographic and Discovery. In recent years he has discovered yet another adult aggregation of Great White Sharks which he has yet to formally announce to the scientific community.

The program is free and open to the public; registration is required. Go to gunnmemoriallibrary.org to sign up.