Overview
- Peer-reviewed findings published November 3 in Frontiers in Marine Science report video-documented hunts by Moctezuma’s pod in August 2020 and August 2022 that killed three juvenile great white sharks.
- The whales worked cooperatively to flip young sharks onto their backs, inducing tonic immobility that left the fish defenseless as the orcas extracted the energy-dense livers.
- Individual orcas were identified from dorsal-fin markings, and the pod is already known to prey on rays as well as whale and bull sharks, indicating a learned, prey-specific tactic.
- The authors propose that climate patterns such as El Niño and broader warming may have shifted white shark nursery areas into the Gulf, increasing encounters with naive juveniles as adults typically evacuate when orcas hunt.
- The study stresses limited observations and outlines plans for diet surveys and targeted fieldwork to assess how common this behavior is and to inform conservation and habitat management.