First documented movement of a whale shark between Madagascar and Seychelles

First documented movement of a whale shark between Madagascar and SeychellesOn December , the Madagascar Whale Shark Project and Marine Conservation Society Seychelles documented the first confirmed movement of an Endangered whale shark Rhincodon typus between Madagascar and Seychelles.The record was established through a collaborative comparison of photo-identification databases, providing information for regional whale shark management in the western Indian Ocean.Since , the Madagascar Whale Shark Project has identified individual juvenile whale sharks around Nosy Be, north-west Madagascar, through long-term photoidentification involving Malagasy students, tourism operators and citizen scientists.However, sightings in Nosy Be declined from individuals in to in .The Marine Conservation Society Seychelles recorded an increase in whale shark sightings in the Seychelles during -, reversing a decline in its estimated population size from - in to just in .These contrasting trends prompted renewed photo-identification comparisons.In November , the Marine Conservation Society Seychelles shared identification photographs from .Using the semi-automated software IS, these images were matched against the complete Madagascar whale shark catalogue by the Madagascar Whale Shark Project team.Both organizations confirmed that one shark-MD- (Mistral), first recorded on November as a . m long male feeding off Nosy Be, Madagascar-was subsequently photographed off Mah, Seychelles, on August , where it was estimated to be m in length.This is the first resighting of a whale shark from Madagascar in another western Indian Ocean country.The estimated , km movement of Mistral adds to the limited number of confirmed multi-country resightings