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Watch: ‘Insanely Rare’ Pied Shark Caught in Florida

Posted on by angelo
Watch: ‘Insanely Rare’ Pied Shark Caught in Florida

Florida angler Jack Appleton has caught and tagged numerous sharks, many from shore. Running a local land shark fishing charter, he mingled with bull sharks, tiger sharks, and most of the other species that inhabit the Gulf of Mexico. But Appleton says his “coolest shark yet” is a rare pied lemon shark he caught this weekend.

Appleton shared an Instagram video of the oddly colored lemon shark on Saturday, which he described as “incredibly rare.” The shark is mainly white with black pepper on its body and black fin tips. “I stumbled across this beauty while bull fishing,” Appleton wrote in his post, referring to bull sharks. He said in a comment that he caught it off Captiva Island, and the video clip shows him landing the lemon shark on a dock.

After lassoing the shark and dragging it to the dock, Appleton saw that the shark had been tagged, meaning he was not the first person to catch it. These tags help researchers track sharks as they grow and roam the oceans, and Appleton helped fill in those gaps by taking measurements of the pied lemon shark and sending them to NOAA, along with the precise location where the shark was captured. He then carefully unhooked the shark and released it into the gulf. (This was in accordance with state regulations because lemon sharks are protected in Florida and “must be released without delay when fishing from shore.”)

Read next: Video: 13-foot Great White Shark Captured on Pensacola Beach

Several commenters noted how rare it is to see a shark with piebaldism. This genetic disease is characterized by a lack of melanin, which causes pigmentation and gives animals their natural coloring. It is seen throughout the animal kingdom, from horses and dogs to black bears and deer. And although they are rare in wild populations, hunters see (and sometimes harvest) pied whitetails every fall.

But for sharks, it’s a different story. According to Rob Chapman, a fishing influencer who reshared Appleton’s video, “there have NEVER been just two recorded versions of a pied shark.”

A fisherman lands a lemon shark.
Appleton carefully removes the hook before releasing the pied lemon shark.

Photo via Instagram

In March 2022, a group of divers encountered a pied nurse shark in Honduras. This was the first documented observation of piebaldism in this particular shark species, according to a study published later that year in the Journal of Fish Biology.

Although impossible to verify, another of the two previously recorded cases mentioned by Chapman could have been the same pied lemon shark that Appleton captured. Commenting on Chapman’s post, Instagram user Michael Sipos claimed to have caught a similar-looking pied lemon shark off Captiva Island in 2022. He did not mention whether he had tagged the shark before releasing him, and neither Appleton nor Sipos immediately responded to requests for comment. .

Read next: The Ultimate Guide to Great White Shark Attacks

Regardless, Appleton said he was grateful to see such a rare fish and to contribute to the small pool of pied shark research.

“There are a lot of crazy creatures in the ocean,” Appleton wrote. “If you spend enough time with bait in the water, something cool is bound to happen.”