The whale shark is a shark, or fish. Whales share the same Kingdom and Phylum, but are of the Class “Mammalia” as are we humans. The following chart will help classify the whale shark scienfically. Scientifc Classification Kingdom Animalia Phylum Chordata Class Chondrichthyes Subclass Elasmobranchii … Read More    

The whale shark is the largest fish in the sea. The largest whale shark on record was caught in 1947 off the coast of Pakistan and measured 12.65m or 41ft 6in long. This is about the length of a school or transit bus. Many people, including fisherman, sailors, … Read More    

Whale sharks are found around the world in tropical and temperate waters. They have been sighted as far North as New York, and as far South as Tasmania. The only body of water that seems to be void is the Mediterannean Sea. Where to find whale sharks Although … Read More    

Many people might be nervous of the whale shark and it’s size. At six feet wide and several feet deep, its mouth is literally large enough to fit a human inside. Thousands of teeth, in hundreds of rowst line its lower and upper jaw. These teeth, however, are smaller … Read More    

For a few months now the small Philippine village of Oslob has created quite the controversy. The town’s main attraction is the hand feeding of small shrimps to whale sharks by local fisherman. All this attention has made a once sleepy town into a tourist hotspot almost overnight. Opinions about … Read More    

Early on March 7 a project leader from the international conservation organization WWF and others in the town of Donsol heard that a live whale shark was being offered for sale at a nearby beach. Expecting a stranded giant, the rescuers found instead a 15-inch (38-centimeter) shark leashed to a … Read More    

Due to the huge increase in whale shark tourism, many places have instituted Whale Shark Guidelines, to help regulate interactions with these Gentle Giants. The first governmental regulations were implemented by the Australia’s Department of Conservation and Land Management for the Whale Sharks of Ningaloo Reef in 1996. Since … Read More    

Brad Norman is theCEO of ECOCEAN Inc., a not-for-profit organization that monitors whale sharks. In 1995, he established photo-identification as an accurate tool to identify and monitor the whale shark population. … Read More    

Whale sharks are one of the more mysterious fish in the sea. Due to their limited time on the surface and ability to dive hundreds of feet and swim thousands of miles, they are a difficult animal to study. Scientiests are trying to find out as much as … Read More    

You could call it a whale of a “swarm”—the biggest observed gathering of whale sharks was spotted off the coast of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula in 2009, according to a recent study. Snapped from a small plane, the above picture shows a white boat (bottom right) amid the fishy gathering. Read … Read More