Diving with Grey Nurse Sharks in Australia: Sites, Seasons and the Rules

The grey nurse shark (Carcharias taurus, called the sand tiger or ragged-tooth elsewhere) is the reason a great many people learn to dive in New South Wales. Up to 3.2 m long, with a mouth full of protruding teeth and a temperament closer to a cow than a predator, it hangs almost motionless in sandy gutters and under overhangs at a small number of sites along the east coast, and divers can spend a whole dive metres from a dozen of them. The east-coast population is listed as critically endangered, with perhaps 2,000 animals, so the encounter comes with rules.

Where

The reliable aggregation sites, from north to south: Wolf Rock at Rainbow Beach (Queensland's gestation site, pregnant females year-round), Flat Rock and Shag Rock off North Stradbroke (winter), Cherubs Cave and Henderson Rock off Moreton Island (winter), Julian Rocks at Byron Bay (June to October), North Solitary Island's Grey Nurse Gutters and Anemone Bay, South Solitary's Shark Gutters, Fish Rock and Green Island at South West Rocks (year-round, most in winter and spring), the Pinnacles and Latitude Rock at Forster and Big Seal and the Big Gutter at Seal Rocks (year-round, large numbers), Broughton Island and Little Broughton off Port Stephens, the Pinnacles at Bangalley Head on the Central Coast, Long Reef's Apartments and Magic Point in Sydney (year-round, most in summer), the Tollgate Islands at Batemans Bay and Montague Island's Shark Gutters near Narooma (summer). Sites in this directory that list grey nurse sharks are collected on the species page.

When

The population migrates seasonally along the coast. Broadly, sharks move north in autumn and winter and south in spring and summer, so the Queensland and northern NSW sites peak from June to October and the Sydney and south-coast sites peak from November to March. The mid-north coast sites (Fish Rock, Forster, Seal Rocks) hold sharks in every month. Mating occurs in the north in spring; pregnant females spend the gestation period at Wolf Rock and a few other sites before returning south to pup in the cooler water.

The approach rules

NSW and Queensland both have codes of conduct backed by law at gazetted critical-habitat sites. Do not touch, feed, chase, harass or block the movement of sharks. Stay out of the gutters and caves they are resting in; observe from the side, not the ends. No flash photography closer than 1.5 m, and no strobes at some sites. Keep to a maximum of ten divers per group and do not use underwater scooters. Boats must not anchor in the critical habitat zones at Magic Point, Fish Rock, Big Seal, the Pinnacles, Broughton Island, Bass Point, the Tollgates, Montague and others; operators use moorings. Fishing with wire trace or bait is banned within the zones. Divers who follow the code get long, calm encounters; divers who crowd the gutters clear the site for everyone.

Telling them apart

Grey nurse sharks are often confused by new divers with the smaller Port Jackson and wobbegong sharks that share the same reefs, and occasionally with bronze whalers or dusky whalers, which are more active and shaped very differently. The grey nurse is bulky, with two dorsal fins of similar size set far back, a long flattened snout and visible teeth even with the mouth closed. Brown spots along the flanks fade with age. They gulp air at the surface and hold it in the stomach for buoyancy, which is why they hover so effortlessly in the gutters.