Whale(shark) Of a Good Time

In Madagascar, these beauties are known as “Marokintana” - which translates to “many stars”

Growing up to 40 feet in length, the whale shark (Rhincodon typus) is the largest fish on the planet.

The Georgia Aquarium is one of the few aquariums in the world to house these bad boys. Over the weekend I had the amazing opportunity to swim with them!

Best part is, you don’t even need to be a diver to do this. Although you can dive in the tank and see a lot of the other species, the whale sharks prefer to stay shallow.

Interested in doing this? Check out The Georgia Aquarium. They also have diving and a ton of other animal encounters:

• Beluga Whale

• Shark & Ray

• Sea Otter

• Sea Lion

• Penguin

• Harbor Seal

• Dolphin

P.S. Check out this Link to see an adorable pup-pup giving a whale shark smooches :)

Fun Facts:

• The Georgia Aquarium had these delivered via UPS using special containers

• The largest whale shark ever recorded was 61.7 feet long

• Researchers are using a pattern-matching algorithm called the Groth algorithm to track wild whale sharks using the pattern of their “stars”

  • It was originally developed by NASA for the Hubble Space Telescope program in order to map stars

• Their eyes are covered in tiny teeth called “dermal denticals”

  • Whale sharks’ eyes lack eyelids and poke out on either side of their heads, which leaves them vulnerable to damage.These tiny teeth help protect them. No other shark species has this feature

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale_shark#/media/File:Whale-Shark-Scale-Chart-SVG-Steveoc86.svg