Ch r is Fa llows
breach life’s a
...and then you fly!
Chris Fallows is an expert on the great white
shark and its hunting habits. He has amassed the largest database of predatory events in False Bay involving these sharks and was the first member of the scientific community to observe their breaching behaviour. Robbie Stammers joined Chris out at sea to view these magnificent beauties up close and personal.
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s we cut our way through the surf on our way to Seal Island, I ask Chris how it all began. “My fascination with large predatory animals started at a very young age, as I grew up always in game parks with my dad (who was a wildlife photographer), watching and learning about the ways of Africa and hoping that someday I could take photos as spectacular as his,” he recalls. After moving to the coast in his early teens, Chris turned his fascination from land predators to marine life. “At first I spent my time tagging smaller sharks and taking photos of them. Slowly, the sharks got bigger, until one day I free-tagged a great white shark off one of our beaches. This began my fascination with these amazing animals – the ultimate predators – which made me want to study them more,” he explains. His endeavours caught the attention of local beach net fishermen and, with their ultimate co-operation, saw him tagging, documenting and releasing more than 15 000 sharks and rays over the next number of years. The great white, though, was the one shark that really entranced Chris. Seal Island was an area close to home and was rumoured to be infested with these sharks, although people had only seen glimpses of them. No one had ever made an effort to go and explore the area to see if the legendary fish were actually there.
The Intrepid Explorer issue 3
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