Swim with whale sharks

New, this summer Blue Note can organize you an unforgettable encounter with the biggest fish of the world, the whale shark.
The whale shark measures 12 m long for a weight of over 12 tons. This species is both coastal and oceanic. Great migrator, the whale shark remains mysterious. Peaceful and rather lazy, this giant of the seas is recognizable by its broad head ended by a huge mouth 2 m wide. Its small teeth are arranged in addition to 300 rows. It filters up to 2000 tons of water per hour. The whale shark has a thick skin of 15 cm.

Despite its size, the whale shark is harmless and devoid of aggression. It travels at a slow pace (around 5 km / h) but is able to cover thousands of kilometers during its migrations. It is generally rather solitary, yet one can sometimes observe groupings in certain lagoons during the periods of reproduction of the animal or that of the corals because they also feed on the milky soup that the latter disperse. The whale shark is an animal that feeds mainly on plankton and small fish whose size does not exceed 10 cm. To do this, he opens his mouth wide and swallows thousands of liters of water containing the food. It expels water through the gill slits and swallows the prey that has remained trapped by swallowing. Apart from some natural predators such as the killer whale and some opportunistic sharks, the whale shark has only humans to fear. Due to its slow reproductive cycle, it is threatened by overfishing and greed. The most popular part of the animal being the fin. This appendix can reach the equivalent of 650 € per kg on the black market in China and Taiwan… The populations are not known because the disparity of their habitats and their long journeys make them difficult to identify. The species was classified as vulnerable by CITES in 2002.