
South Africa’s great white sharks heading for extinction
Only 353 to 522 great white sharks left in South African waters
The magnificent great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias L.) is one of the oldest shark lineages with an evolutionary origin dating back about 14 million years. New research from Stellenbosch University (SU) shows that the South African white shark population is double jeopardy. Not only do these sharks have the lowest genetic diversity of all white shark populations worldwide, but there are also only between 353 to 522 individuals left.