A dog walker solved the mystery of a missing great white shark.
Marine biologist Dr Riley Elliott installed four tags to track sharks as apart of their research.
They were trying to figure out key questions around sharks, where they come from and go, and how their movements overlap with people.
But then the doctor was left shocked when one of the tags, attached to a great white named Daisy, suddenly washed ashore.
He said this was due to floods and bad weather, which leaves the ocean littered with debris which can pull the tags off.
Daisy’s wasn’t the only tag, and he managed to recover a few others.
But that’s when satellite tracking data showed her tag didn’t stop moving.
After it washed up on a beach in Tauranga, north New Zealand, it kept moving into central Gate Pa before finally stopping near a demolition company, cycle store, glass splashback business and some houses.
However, the tag is only accurate to a few hundred metres, so Elliot wasn’t sure exactly where it had ended up.
He took to social media to continue his hunt for the tag, and received considerable support but no one came forward until he received a phone call this Monday.
It was from Gate Pa resident Leanne who said her flat mate David had stumbled across the tag whilst working his dog, Thor, along the beach.
Every day, David litter picks along the beach, and had found the tag, and taken it home to Leanne.
But then he had a hospital appointment the following day before he went away for a short period of time, leading to him to miss the social media push.
Elliot said the two residents were shark fans and added: “Thank you to everyone who put the word out, shared the posts, searched the beaches, told your relatives, amazing work.”
Once he’d received it back, the next step was reattaching it to Daisy - which was to prove difficult after having received no signal from her for months.
But then last week he got a ping from the shark off Matakana Island, not far from where the tag washed up.
The location can only ping when the shark’s dorsal fin, and satellite tag, broke the surface of the ocean.
Sharks, unlike dolphins, don’t need to come to the surface to breathe, so it’s not uncommon to go so long without contact.
Elliot is now continuing his search for Daisy, a 4-year-old and 2.75 metres long great white shark, who was the first to be tagged on December 3 in 2022.
