Crews of two vessels worked to untangle huge creature from lobster trap line

A15

BY ALAN COCHRANE
TIMES & TRANSCRIPT STAFF

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ALMA - The MacDonald family of Alma has been fishing lobster and other species for many years, but the 30-foot basking shark they hooked Thursday night is the biggest monster they've every brought home from the Bay of Fundy.

The huge basking shark measured over 28 feet (8.7 metres) and its tail was nine feet (2.7 metres) across. It was estimated to weigh over 4,000 pounds (1,800 kilograms).

"They thought they had a great white shark at first," said Catherine MacDonald, mother of Justin and Joseph MacDonald, the two fishermen who found the huge creature entangled in their lobster lines Thursday night. The brothers were making repairs to their boats late yesterday and weren't available to comment on the discovery and the adventure that followed. The MacDonald family operates Thankful Too Family Fisheries and the Alma Lobster Shop.

Catherine said Justin had been out fishing all day Thursday aboard the Thankful 2, when he and his crew discovered that a line of lobster traps had been moved far off their anchor point. The trawl line has about 20 lobster traps attached to a buoy and anchored at each end. He discovered the shark had gotten tangled in the line and called his brother Joseph, who was fishing nearby aboard the Grateful 1. Although the men were exhausted from a full day of fishing, they had to deal with the huge shark and the tangled mess it had gotten itself into. They believe the shark died after struggling and pulling the anchored line.

Catherine MacDonald said there was no way they could pull the huge sea creature into the lobster boat, which is 28 feet wide across the bow. They had to use special anchor rope to tow the dead creature to shore. Once there, they attached it to a front-end loader to pull it onto the dock to measure it.

"It was quite an event," Catherine said.

The MacDonalds plan to keep the tail and the jaws for display in the lobster shop, along with the skull of a whale and the tail of another shark collected years ago.

The rest of the shark will be taken out to sea and disposed of properly, she said.

The basking shark, Cetorhinus maximus, is the second largest fish, after the whale shark. It is a cosmopolitan species -- it is found in all the world's temperate oceans. It is a slow moving and generally harmless filter feeder. It does not have large teeth like its more ferocious cousin, the great white. Like other large sharks, basking sharks are at risk of extinction due to a combination of low resilience and overfishing to supply the worldwide market for the shark's fins, flesh and organs. It is called the basking shark because it is most often observed when feeding at the surface and appears to be basking.