Big shark spotted on sunday

I am not a sea angler (a bit of coarse fishing every now and then) but thought you may all be interested in this. I took a drive out to North Clare on Sunday (fab weather) took the coast road out to Fanore, the beach area was packed so drove on about 2miles and parked up on the hill going towards Doolin. Myself and my wife parked up and decided to hop over the stone wall and have an hour just sitting and taking in the view from the rocks. Something we often do.

It was about 3.15pm when we both noticed a shark fin in the water about 60 yards from the shore, I have no idea what sort of shark but he was a big fella and I fancy probably 10-12ft in length, I could just make his shadow out under the water, and as he approached some gulls that were sitting in the water they all flew off in a panic. I have looked through some old fisherman’s handbooks that are years old and it could have been a blue shark? We often go for a sit on the rocks when the beach is crowded but this is the first time I have ever seen a shark. Just wondering exactly what it was.

If anyone goes fishing here in the next day or two you better take a big net!!!!!!

chances are it was a big blue shark, often known to frequent the area this time of year..

basking shark used to be around in numbers but were nearly wiped out decades ago with overfishing, would be nice to see them back in numbers again :) :wink:

In fact basking sharks have been around in numbers this year. If you look at [url]http://www.iwdg.ie/article.asp?id=1814[/url], this gives some idea of what it was like further south earlier in the summer. Pretty amazing. Many sharks, very close in shore.

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Thanks for the information guys very interesting. A bit more searching of information today has not revealed an awful lot, but it looks like it could also have been a Threasher Shark or a Porbeagle Shark but it seems these types of shark are only seen well offshore, so I guess it was a blue shark or possibly a barsking shark.

When we go out to the coast I normally take my binoculars for looking at boats and wildlife etc, but this time because it was a spur of the moment decision to go out for the afternoon they were left at home, which I am very annoyed about. But still count myself very lucky to have actually seen one even though its seems that they are quite common visitors to Irish shores. Happy fishing to you all.

porbeagles come really close to shore!

Typically, blues do not come close to the shoreline at all
Porbeagles have been taken from the shore on the clare coastline
Thresher sharks are really distinctive having a tail almost half their body length, and are very rare in Irish waters

So, probably a basking or porbeagle shark

Exciting stuff though

Kev