Shark feeding frenzy captured metres from coastline
THOUSANDS of tiny fish, hundreds of sharks and a three-day bait buffet off the Australian coast.
These amazing photographs capturing bronze whaler sharks in a feeding frenzy just metres off a West Australian beach were taken by photographer Sean Scott, who drew the line at entering the water, despite dozens of swimmers, surfers and snorkellers braving the ocean.
"I contemplated going in but I thought I'd leave them to it, I don't think swimming in the middle of a bait ball is the smartest thing to do," the landscape photographer said.
Bait balls are the result of tiny fish packing together as a defensive mechanism when attacked and appear as huge dark shadows in the water, although Mr Scott said he had never seen one as big as this, which occurred last week off the coast of the tiny northwest town Red Bluff, 1000km north of Perth.
Unfortunately, the surfers aren't the only ones soaking up the sea and sunshine. Bronze whaler sharks hunt just metres from people. Pictures: Diimex / Sean Scott
Mr Scott said the bait ball constantly changed shape and size but at one point was hundreds of metres long and more than 20m wide, drifting so close to the shore that several larger bronze whalers catching a wave had to pull out at the last minute.
