Find Real Sea Monsters off Isle of Man Beaches!
If basking sharks didn't exist, story tellers would have to invent them! We are so lucky on the Isle of Man where these wonderful creatures visit us every year. Basking sharks are the second biggest fish in the world. Baby basking sharks are as long as a motorbike. Fully grown basking sharks are longer than a bus! Put your mouse over the picture to find out who took the photograph.
Ask your mum or dad to take you on a real adventure.
Look for basking sharks off the Isle of Man! Look at these pictures
to see what you could see!
A real sea monster! LOOK at the size of that mouth. You could stand up inside the mouth of a big basking shark, not that you would want to! This basking shark is eating millions of tiny shrimp called plankton. It does not eat fish, jellyfish (or people)!
These are shrimp from the plankton. Each one is smaller than a rice grain, smaller than an 'o' on this page. Basking sharks have to eat MILLIONS of them every hour.
See. one basking shark eating plankton, not interested in people!
Sometimes you only see the basking shark's dorsal fin.
You might be lucky and see the nose, the dorsal fin AND the tail fin. This makes it easy to tell how big the basking shark is.
The big white mouth can be the first thing you see under the water. This basking shark has a floppy dorsal fin.
You can look for basking sharks from the shore. These sharks are close to Peel castle.
Some people are VERY lucky. They get to SWIM with basking sharks. This has to be done with GREAT CARE as you do not want to disturb their feeding. This is a very small, young basking shark.
Phew! That is a BIG fin! Sometimes you see people kayaking near to basking sharks off Niarbyl on the Isle of Man. They do not paddle when a basking shark is near because it might disturb it.
Basking sharks have little tiny eyes,
VERY BIG mouths,
and VERY BIG noses!
They have beautiful skin.
But they have bad wrinkles around their mouths!
Don't mention the fish lice near their gills! Quick, call for the flea shampoo!
They 'fly' through the water using their big pectoral fins like aeroplane wings to steer.
They can look toothless and quite, quite, harmless ,
Their babies have cute little piggy noses-----------------but-------
Don't forget, they ARE sea monsters so keep looking and enjoy yourselves!
If you see a basking shark get your mum or dad to help you report it to our
MANX BASKING SHARK WATCH!
Link to Basking Shark Facts for Kids.
Link to Revolting Basking Shark Facts.
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