Spoke to a guy I know who had been out SUPing at Makaha on Sunday. Got a very bad fin gash in his foot. He said he was floating around in all the blood and left a trail as he scrambled in. Then you see the size of the noah from the fisho's Gopro and think faaarrrkkk!!!!!!! Scary stuff.
Apparently a bit of a regulat between Northy and Longy.

Yes they are out there indeed.......

Last Wednesday 26th August three of my SUP mates were at Ocean Beach Umina SUPing when they spotted a large shark about 3m long just outside the break hanging around. There were lots of fish around as well.

Was big enough to get them all to come in.

Did not get close enough to tell what type it was.

stehsegler said..
That looks like it was shot a long way from the beach. I am sure there are plenty of sharks around the area but I doubt there are too many close to the break especially when it's big.It's not all that deep around the reef area at Makaha. I'd venture to say a great white that size wouldn't go anywhere near water that shallow just to have a look.

Yeah, just keep telling yourself that when you're treading water a few hundred meters out!

Been a bad year for sharks. Thankfully I haven't seen any lately. But I know there around- too many schools of nervous salmon... Sharks will happily go in any depth of water if there's a chance of an easy meal.

John340 said..
Has something changed?

I think it's a combo of a few things. (1) Whites' are protected- so their numbers are growing every year. and (2) Inshore beach netting has removed much of these sharks food supply- mullet, tailor, bream, blackfish, mulloway etc. These juvenile white pointers (which are primarily an inshore shark in their younger years) are basically left with two readily available food options- salmon (which are still in good numbers due to having no commercial value) and people.

There's really no reason why things are going to get any better. The way it is, things can get only get worse. Unless the protected species title is removed, or beach haulers catch rates are reduced (to add a few more species to the menu) things will remain pretty hairy when swimming in the ocean. Hopefully I'm horribly wrong as I near live in the ocean Time will tell I guess...

there is an interesting article over at swellnet.
http://www.swellnet.com/news/surfpolitik/2015/08/11/north-coast-shark-activity-new-theory

I was kinda interested in this myself because I spend a bit of time in northern nsw so started googling some stuff and so now I'm an internet expert... .

I read some interesting stuff and a couple of things jumped out.

there was a study into the east Australian current that found the amount of upwelling off the northern nsw coast is directly related to the position of the East Australian Current. the closer to the coast the more upwelling. The shape of the EAC also has an influence on the water temps. A thin EAC stream tends to leave a pool of colder water along the coast.

There are some studies from WA that say that white shark attacks generally occur in water temps less than 20deg and are more likely when the whales are migrating.

so my leap of faith here is that the position of the EAC and the Upwelling due to wind and EAC position has formed an area of activity along the coast of NSW which the sharks are feeding in. if the area of upwelling was further offshore I'd guess the sharks would be further offshore.

if you look on the BOM sst charts the area along the coast is below 20deg and the area off the coast is above 20 deg.

one thing is for sure that area from Byron to Ballina is the most wildlife packed piece of water I've ever seen.