Hunters in the Shadows_ Uncovering Sevengill Territory | Ocean Predators | Episode 2

I'm underwater filmmaker Kina Scholar. I was attacked by a great white shark but now I spend my life filming the top of the food chain. Join me for encounters with orca, sea lions and sharks. This is Ocean Predators. In the waters around New Zealand live over 70 species of shark. Perhaps the most mysterious is the broadnose sevengill. Found in all temperate oceans on earth this shark is a top level predator. The species is known to hunt in packs in Australia and South Africa but almost nothing is known about New Zealand's sevengills. Down here they lurk undisturbed in some of the most remote waters on the planet. We're heading to Port Pegasus at the bottom of New Zealand's third biggest island, Stewart Island. We've joined the New Zealand Department of Conservation aboard the Southern Winds. We're searching for a population of sevengill sharks that I've filmed only once before. They have never been studied by scientists and I want to find out more. Away we stop at the only settlement on Stewart Island. Less than 400 people live here at Half Moon Bay and it has one of my favourite pubs in the world. We're here to pick up local conservation legend Fred Dobbins. Fred has been observing these elusive sharks for more than 10 years and knows exactly how to find them. I'm just a bit of a little um sort of rock backboard stand on um quite a little current eddy there and you're literally just standing there and they're coming up around your feet. Awesome. It's quite cool. They weren't huge they're probably I don't know two, two and a half metres. Yeah right, they're still bigger than me. Yeah, yeah. For us to Port Peckis is about four to five hours and we're travelling at a reasonable speed. I mean most people probably don't actually realise how remote it is down here. Oh I think absolutely the majority of New Zealanders have got no idea. I mean um you know it's not an easy place to get to right at the bottom. We're as far away as as from Auckland as you can be in New Zealand really. So the majority of New Zealand population probably has very little idea about um you know the remoteness or what's here. It's not for the faint-hearted in terms of those people coming out on boats. You need a big boat to do this this section. You know Port Pegasus is not small boat territory either really. Infamous bit of water. Yeah it is. This is Port Pegasus. It's worth the journey. We'll base ourselves here for the expedition right in the heart of thousands of square kilometres of wilderness. The first chance we get Fred and I scope out the place. He found the population of sevengill sharks over a decade ago and knows this place like the back of his hand. Yeah I've only ever seen females up here. I saw one about, one was about three metres when she was massive. She was like a she's like a 44-gallon drum round. Yeah right. Huge fish. A few years ago I was filming down here with my safety diver Ross Finnell and the sevengills literally chased us out of the water. Our first dive that we did at hands was off this wall. Oh yeah. Because it's quite deep here. Yeah yeah. And so we just dropped straight down. It was like dirty dirty dirty. Yeah. We didn't even get to the bottom before we were mobbed. Yeah right. And we're retreating and we ended up hard and against the rocks here. Yeah. And I was pushing them off of the camera while Ross climbed on the boat and then and then they rolled me in. So this is this is the this is the hot spot you were telling me about. Yeah. Right. It'll be interesting to know too whether they're coming in here in the outgoing tide more. Yeah. Or the incoming tide more you know. Yeah. I suppose it depends how the eddy eddy kind of works. Yeah. I've seen here both tides are high and low. Right. Um when there's a bit of flow. So well this could be a great spot for us to start our. Yeah. Start our diving then. Yeah. We've got a nice little ledge there. Nice little ledge. Yeah. Little holes to hide in. Yeah. And they're actually coming up and sticking their heads out of the water. Yeah ----. So the sea cucumbers they could be part of the story as well. They can be pretty nasty. Can I just you know skip out I just really need to know what you've got in terms of trauma gear or in case we have a bit of an incident with sharks. When you dive with any sharks without a cage you need a pretty serious trauma kit. My team Ross Finnell and Brady Doak know the drill but I need to bring skipper Chris Pascoe up to speed. Sharks are generally not out to bite us and eat us and if they do it's probably likely to be a situation where they've got wound up you know where when we're new guys on the block and it could even be competitive behaviour. So they could even be biting us to try and get us to bugger off. Yeah. With white sharks which is what we Ross and I are working with a hell of a lot. Yeah. You're liable to have like you know a limb missing whereas these guys it's liable to be a lesser bite because we've got dry suits and stuff on and their mouth is just physically smaller and I mean it's still probably be a bloody good hole but it's less likely to be an amputation or you know really really big. So it's more likely to be it's more likely to be loss of blood. Yeah. So it's more likely to be the shock that we're dealing with in terms of. Exactly. So the treatment starts in the water with whoever's with us. We'd apply a tourniquet and stop some bleeding. Velcro strap that goes through a buckle so you can just pull it tight. Yeah. Velcro it off and not let you pull it real tight on them and then you can just wind it right up. Once they're out of the water it's about plugging the holes and keeping them alive. So to that end we carry the blood clotting gauze and actually pull that out and scrunch it up. It'll fill quite a big hole. Our next priority is to get fluid back into them. Yeah. To that end we've got two different fluid delivery systems. So we've got your standard IV and we've got IO or bone injection. So it's a spring-loaded gun it's got a big arrow to tell you which way that that it's going to go and it's got a safety catch there. So once you've figured it all out measure it choose your spot even use a marker pen hold it nice and firm and it'll just go bang. Well it's good to be underway. Nice to be underway. Let's go for a dive. Let's go for a dive. 47 degrees south it's bloody cold there's a lot of current it's dark and there's a bunch of sharks. I mean it's not really sounding like the beginning of a nice story. So in a place like this you've got to have the A-team and I mean I always have Ross watching my back. Ross is a commercial diver and has dived with me in so many different places and I can focus completely on the camera and I know that Ross is going to be behind me watching my back. I think as soon as we jump in we're going to see them they'll come up they'll come straight after our splash. I can almost guarantee it hey. Okay so what are you saying a little bottle of scotch on that? Yeah okay bottle of scotch on that. Usual rules. Here in New Zealand I think we've got some of the most challenging environments to film wildlife and I always choose the very best crew in New Zealand for these shoots. I mean Brady's shot from the under the ice in Antarctica through to the tropics and everywhere in between and these guys could hold their own anywhere in the world. It's really interesting that we haven't seen a single male to explain what they're doing here. One mark around the front of that girl. You've got Brady's back to say that none of these sharks are actually hunting us or really out to attack us but they're certainly curious with their fins. Beautiful wilderness there's not a sign of human habitation here. It's a massive estuary up there massive tidal catchment. There's gog and magog in the distance they're just big lumps of granite sticking out of a huge forest. All the tannins from the forest floor get washed down and as they hit the seawater they float on top and cut all the light out. Must be such a rich area. Perfect sevengill environment you can see looking down into it it's like tea. Low light just the perfect amount of spooky for sevengill sharks. As soon as the shadows come into play the sevengills come out to play. This one here now is coming past slowly here we go two in there that's phenomenal I mean how many places whoa he's got his mouth open and all I think he liked my red bands. How many places do you see predators like this right on the right on the shore? I've never been anywhere where you can attract a big apex predator right off the rocks with a with a broken muscle. Here comes one now you can see the see the white on the bottom of his jaw there as you see them coming at you you you I always call it the evil grin it's his bottom lip really and it's um often the first thing you see when you see them in very low light shadow in the environments. The spots are amazing they stand out on the surface like this and draw your eye to the shark but on the bottom and the dark shell studded bottom they just blend in it's an it's an amazing camouflage and if you look at them from underneath they're they're pale and so if you're on the bottom of the ocean and they're above you they disappear into the light so it's it's like a lot of predator species they have a perfect camouflage for the environment that they hunt in. You see the gills there I mean most sharks have five gills and seven gills related to an ancient line of sharks that still have seven gills and it makes them really really unique. You can see me here it knows that my hand is not the target and we shouldn't do this at home. The shark's skin is amazing when you run your hand from head to tail they're like silk but if you run your hand the other way like this look at this if you run your hand the other way from tail to head it's like sandpaper and it'll actually that's why it does so much damage to the front of our camera ports. Sevengill sharks teeth are also super fascinating even though when you look at a sevengill they kind of look a bit gummy and they look like they don't have any teeth in there when you look at it like that they're bloody big teeth for the size of the animal really different to a lot of other sharks their bottom teeth are curved one way and shaped for cutting and the top are classic pinning shark's teeth. Oh ---- that's a big fish and so they'll actually bite and twist and and tear big chunks out of their prey. Really different to any other shark and those uniquely shaped bottom teeth were highly prized by some Maori to make weapons with. This fierce looking tool is known as a maripi tuatini and it has sevengill's bottom teeth fixed to its cutting edge. Knives like these were used by Maori across New Zealand and were designed to do what sevengill shark teeth do best slice through flesh. I love this place then we better start with a couple of those just to make sure and then perhaps a oyster to um wash it down with I mean my god this is paradise. Most parts of the world they call them a sea urchin. New Zealand they're a great name somebody named them awesomely kina and um throw these in to attract a few fish which will hopefully attract the sharks. Pretty amazing to be able to just wade out not get your gumboots wet and get some kinas and some bluff oysters. Oh here's a shark right here look at that the kinas are working amazingly well so while I'm while I'm hoping that kin of shark's come right up onto the shallow rock this place is incredible. There's one out here look at the shark it's in a foot of water and it's carrying on in I mean phenomenal I mean they do seem to like the camera more than my toes which is great okay I take that back this one does really want my toes so I'm just going to keep an eye out now in case one comes up behind me you kind of don't want to be doing this unless you've got a reasonable idea of shark behaviour and a couple of safety guys with big long sticks real close by if things get out of hand because if one of these guys gets you by the leg I mean they weigh they weigh they're gonna weigh a lot more than you do and they would roll you over pretty quick and they're capable of a hell of a turn of speed I mean they will surprise you and you it's really not hard to imagine how they would hunt together to bring down a prey that's a lot larger than them. These guys bite more people in New Zealand than any other species of shark I mean they're really different shark to a lot of sharks that we're used to seeing on TV their dorsal fin is right down there way down their back at the basically the top of their caudal stem. Shit that camouflage I mean look at that can't even see so so I reckon that's a male it looks like it's got claspers see this is what fascinates me is I mean why what are they doing like coming up on top of the rocks and they're really really active up here and I truly do wonder whether we're not watching some sort of courtship behaviour because there's a lot of interaction between individual sharks that's definitely not related to what we're doing and so many of the females have super fresh bites which are highly likely to be mating scars. I really do wonder I know that other shark species mate in really shallow water and and they bite on each other this one's our male I've noticed a couple of times and a third one right here coming up to the camera we've got three sharks and so what are they doing like are that really does look like courtship behaviour that one the male was trying to bite the female on the fin and this one's going to come right in shallow I've got to watch behind me here there's two more behind me I honestly think look at that they're trying to latch on to each other and that's classic mating behaviour which I don't know that anybody's ever seen in seven gills but it's certainly been seen in other species so often with seven gills when you see one you'll see a bunch of them and they really have a classic I guess it's a pack or a cooperative hunting behaviour where one will come in from one way and you can almost bet that there'll be another one sneaking in from another angle and often a third one coming in from another angle and they that's what makes them so full on to dive with you know you're constantly spinning around there's one there there's one there and then there's another one over there and it's really classic cooperative hunting behaviour I mean these guys have been found to have large mammals in their stomach contents all over the world and in fact proportionately they find more large mammal and seven gill stomach contents than they do in white shark contents so these guys really are a key apex predator that shark when it came in it was had its nose hard on my camera lens and wouldn't back off so I just put my hand over the sensors on the end of its nose and just lifted its head up that puts them into a kind of tonic and even though I didn't turn him right over to make him go into full tonic it's his mouth opened up and here he is this is the little guy I think coming back for more tonic immobility is a state that sharks and rays will go into when they when they are turned upside down in various ways where you put your hand over the sensors on the end of their nose they actually go into a almost relaxed and go into like a zombie state and um and I mean I don't like to do it for fun to sharks but that guy just had his nose hard on my camera port for um for ages so I couldn't resist it and you saw as he he relaxed and rolled over he opens his mouth but he wasn't trying to bite me these sharks when they commit themselves to biting something they have a it's almost like an automatic reflex to protect their eye I mean the eyes roll back in their head it looks quite freaky they can grow teeth back but they can't grow eyes back so they're they're designed to protect themselves they're used to attacking prey they can fight back and and you know a seal or whatever could come around and damage their eyes so they have this pretty cool technology really I mean look as this light does fade a little bit and um I think it it's almost time to call it a day it's pretty amazing to see what we've just seen today and here's my friend that loves my camera port look at him right into it come on buddy can I can I topside uh comms check comms check topside you get me there yeah copy that chris we will start heading down with the current yeah roger that okay good luck how dark it is with all the rain there's so much tannin in the water like if you filled your swimming pool with tea bags the actual water is stained dark and the tea colored water it just sucks up all the light we've got the light hardly penetrates it's the middle of the day and it's like diving in a pit what do you think should we kick back down current or do you want to stick here when we got a little bit of cover keep close to the wall roger roger if you're concerned we can always call the storm engine to come back okay at the moment yeah roger that good girl right up behind the bank roger that you can tell that there's another shot here something really really close there you go their strategy is to circle you when you can't see them and then take you by surprise this is why they love the shadows they use the darkness to hunt which is why this is their prime hunting because we know that there's probably a dozen of them here topside topside copy chris can i can i topside getting you good you're getting me over yeah roger chris sorry just have a shot to pick up on me we're getting pushed around by the current we'll probably start getting on the wall reasonably soon yeah roger can i you're about 15 meters off the shelf if you keep going um too much more with the tide you're going to go straight past the shelf can i we'll head up into the shadows and finish our dive at about five or six meters coming across the top behind yep copy that are you coming to the surface that was definitely not what i expected that was uh that was full on a little bit more like the poor pegasus that we know and love what do you reckon they were getting pretty aggressive yeah could be interesting yeah i reckon if we'd stayed at the bottom of this bank here they would have started biting ---- you know probably like us you know i mean i like to think we're quick enough to stick something between us and them but uh i mean preferably ross there are a few hunting huts dotted around the bottom of stewart island so we camped here for a couple of nights at the north pegasus hut we've been waiting on the weather so i could catch up with my mate zane smith zane's a born and bred stewart islander he's a pilot and a commercial parlor diver and he knows a thing or two about good dive spots what's he got here mate i've bought beakers and get this for your way i mean right down in the yeah for sure yep yeah it's an amazing spot well i mean you've seen quite a few seven girls i've only seen a few splitting your time between flying around places like this power diving and and a bit of time hooning around as choppers in the tropics it looks like you've kind of got the life every uh bloke wants yeah i like it anyway good oh this looks like an awesome spot mate the water looks clear we might land uh where we land might just land by the creek there i think yeah a few sea lions down that east end by the look of it oh fantastic a few sea lions and a few powers and they might scratch up happen if you're lucky that's how it began yeah you could be forgiven for thinking we're in the tropics on a day like today but this is broad bay right at the bottom of stewart island the sea sea lions on a more or less mainland beach like this i mean i know we're probably the last sandy beach between here and the auckland islands a few hundred miles south but that's pretty phenomenal site isn't it yeah how long have these guys been hanging out here for well sometimes they're here sometimes they're not but um yeah easy mate so these young males hey they're pretty they seem to be like these two here they're young males trying to puff the chest out and yeah find their place in the world these big old boys here probably couldn't care less how long have you been seeing this for maybe the last five to ten years i think maybe it's a good idea to give this guy a bit of space what do you reckon amazing looking critter isn't it yeah yes he's he's been around well let's hope it's the start of something i mean it's pretty special for a species that's been pushed to the brink of its range yeah we're coming back and breeding in these places so they could make it quite an interesting power drive yeah i'd say yeah they'll be they'll be interested to see what's going on i'd say yeah that's awesome though to be honest i mean you've said to me that these are my favorite favorite ocean predator to swim with of all of them yeah the more i swim with them the more i like them yeah they're intimidating but they're not they're all talk really well i reckon uh leave these guys to do their strapping amongst themselves and go and get our gear on get a feed i'm getting peckish this beach is at the bottom of the world the very last bit of steward island before antarctica it's a hell of a place to get you by boat i feel pretty lucky to be here i was a professional power diver for 20 years and believe me power diving in these latitudes isn't often like this heading back to the beach we come across this little guy it is a surprise because seahorses are usually hiding in the seaweed they're a pretty cool predator in their own right they sneak up on their prey and suck them in swallow them whole i'm pretty pleased these guys aren't big this local's curiosity has got the better of them sea lions are a classic they love to play and nip it's a bit like hanging out with a very very big puppy friendly locals i think he's one of those mates oh what are you doing everyone you want to stop back at ours on the way back and sounds good you don't mind if they're pretty mildly cooked here no i'm going to just basically just run them through the pan so there's nothing uh nothing flash going on here mate you boys must be hungry too hey yeah the thing about my cooking is the less i do to it the as someone who spends a lot of time diving in these parts zane's got a few great stories about sea lions um it was the end of the day and i jumped in i spared a green bone she came straight in grabbed it off the end of the spear and ate it bugger yeah but then she went from being quite aggressive to being my best friend like that so i thought i was looking for another green bone to spare and i felt this look on my cheek look around and it was the whisk her whiskers and as i looked around she looked around and we both i thought how am i going to get another green bone for tea so i spared a wickety it's a wrasse and she ate that and she wishes off eating that i quickly spared a couple more green bone and got into the dinghy boy and so she figured out what you're she was waiting for you to spare another one yeah and you reckon when you felt the whiskers she was going oh what about that one yeah well she was right right there looking looking for a fish as well you know oh should i'd love to see that what a neat bloody trip that was maybe one day