Thousands of seasonal visitors have been seen around Jupiter Inlet in Palm Beach County. The sharks are not the two-legged type from northern states, but the aggregations of blacktip sharks, some spotted a few yards from the shore where Stephen Kajiura, professor of biological sciences at Florida Atlantic University, has spent years or research.
The sharks do not appear to be assembling north of Jupiter Inlet or along the Treasure Coast. Aerial video shows the sharks migrating from Palm Beach to Singer Island, according to CBS12.
Furthermore, there were no shark sightings at Martin Public Beach, nor were there beach closures due to sharks, according to Gabriella Ferraro, the spokesperson of Martin County.
Speaking to Treasure Coast Palm, Kajiura said, "It seems the sharks really like Palm Beach. They like Palm Beach County for some reason."
The reason could be that the continental shelf, an underwater landmass that results into an area of relatively shallow water, becomes broader further north. The shelf narrows dramatically against Beach County, attracting sharks close to the shore.
Kajiura added, "That's why we have this huge number, Palm Beach area and south, where you simply don't have them up north. They're there, but they're probably distributed over a much broader area and so you just don't see those large dense aggregations that you see down here."
The professor has been taking aerial studies of shark abundance in Palm Beach County since 2011, and he expanded to Miami Beach in 2015.
According to his research, the largest concentration of blacktip sharks, estimated at over 10,000, is found north of Boynton Inlet to Jupiter Inlet. While other shark species migrate, they are in deeper water or they cannot just be seen.
Kajiura's findings indicated that sharks spend January to March in Southeast Florida before going back to Georgia and the Carolinas to mate. During the period, they pass through the Treasure Coast. Currently, the sharks are close to the shore, possibly because of the availability of mullet and menhaden, the preferred meal of the sharks.
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