Sharks love metal music—who knew?
A few years back, a Discovery Channel documentary team was filming some horrendously titled piece called Bride of Jaws for Shark Week. They were in search of a great white they’d named Joan of Shark (hah… hah). Now, it’s a known fact shark are attracted to low-frequency vibrations, which mimic the sounds of struggling fish. And what easily accessible sound has the lowest-frequency vibrations around? Death metal.
Check it out! This documentarian, Matt, plays his “favorite band” Darkest Hour for the sharks. Darkest Hour is awesome.
The sick tune-age of Darkest Hour helped attract a couple sharks, but not the fabled Joan. Per the Independent:
Desperate to feature the 16-foot, 1.6 tonne shark in their documentary, they submerged a speaker to see if the shark would react. Unfortunately they didn’t manage to attract Joan, but did catch the attention of two others, one of which was 12 feet long.
Not bad, though, right? This information, if applied in an environmentally friendly, sustainable way, could actually be beneficial for sharks, whose behavior is affected when humans seek to attract them through other means.
Filmmakers and shark-spotters usually use chum, a mix of fish parts, bones and blood, to attract sharks. By reducing the amount of chum they give to the sharks, humans will be able to reduce their impact on the shark’s natural behaviour.
This is all pretty fitting, by the way—if you think about it, is there really any animal out there more metal than a vicious, voracious great white?
(h/t Independent)