Ryan Johnson (marine scientist)

Last updated
Ryan Johnson
Born (1977-01-30) January 30, 1977 (age 43)
Tauranga, N.Z.
Alma mater University of Pretoria
Occupation Marine Biologist, Television host
ChildrenFinn Johnson
Website Ryan Johnson homepage

Ryan Johnson (30 January 1977) is a marine biologist specializing in researching sharks. [1] He is best known for the shark documentaries that he features in and hosts. [2]

Contents

Early life

Johnson grew up in the coastal town of Mount Manganui, New Zealand. As an avid sailor, rower and snorkeler, his passion for the oceans was established early.

Growing up his other passion was Rugby where he gained his provincial age group colours and represented Tauranga Boys' College's 1st IV in 1993 & 1994 as a flanker.

South Africa

In 1998 he moved to South Africa to pursue a scientific career researching the Great White Shark. At the University of Pretoria he conducted his honours, masters and doctoral theses. During this time he spent a year living on Dyer Island where he began his research into the Great White Shark's life history. In 2007, he co-founded Oceans Research with three colleagues. In 2011 he helped expose the illegal catching of a shark, an action which caused great controversy. [3] Johnson has tagged Great White Sharks for research purposes. [4]

Personal life

Johnson lives in Mossel Bay, South Africa with his partner Fiona Ayerst and son Finn Johnson where he conducts research as a Scientist in Residence at Oceans Research, while also directing the work of other divisions of the Oceans such as multimedia design company Oceans Interactive and great white shark inspired clothing range Carcharias.

He's a distant cousin of American film director Rian Johnson.

Research highlights

Johnson was part of the first South African team to successfully attach a satellite transmitters to a great white shark on 24 July 2001. Johnson has tagged Great White Sharks for research purposes. [4] His major scientific discoveries have been the satellite tracking of Nicole (a 3.6m great white shark) on a return migration from South Africa to Australia and back, and documenting the Great White Shark hunting Cape fur seal at night time, a previously unknown behavior. Between 2001 and 2005 Johnson conducted research on the controversial practice of chumming great white shark for tourism, often called cage diving, where he discovered evidence of conditioning, however he did not link this to increased numbers of attacks on human beings. In January 2008 he led a pilot study to Ponto Do Ora (Mozambique) on the Zambezi shark, also known as the Bull shark.

Johnson was also part of the team that tracked the Ironbound White Shark in the waters south of Key Biscayne, near Miami [5] . Ironbound was caught and tagged on October 3 off Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, and has traveled 1,473 miles down the US East Coast since then [5] .

Television programs

Between 1998 and present Johnson has featured as a marine scientist in numerous documentaries including Naked Science (National Geographic), Earth Investigated (National Geographic), Animal Camera (BBC) and After the Attack (Discovery Channel). Since 2006 he has hosted Shark Tribe with Dave Salmoni (Discovery Channel), Sharkville (National Geographic) and Shark Pit Mystery (National Geographic). In 2008, Ryan was a guest on Good Morning America with Diane Sawyer, The O'Rielly Factor with Bill O'Reilly 25, Fox and Friends, Inside Edition and Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld.

Johnson has appeared locally on South African television in productions such as 50/50, Carte Blanche and the Big Question debate show. In 2012, he joined shark taggers OCEARCH in South Africa as Chief Scientist. The expedition was filmed as a 10 part series called SHARK WRANGLERS for the History Channel.

Related Research Articles

Great white shark Species of large lamniform shark

The great white shark, also known as the great white, white shark or "white pointer", is a species of large mackerel shark which can be found in the coastal surface waters of all the major oceans. It is notable for its size, with larger female individuals growing to 6.1 m (20 ft) in length and 1,905–2,268 kg (4,200–5,000 lb) in weight at maturity. However, most are smaller; males measure 3.4 to 4.0 m, and females measure 4.6 to 4.9 m on average. According to a 2014 study, the lifespan of great white sharks is estimated to be as long as 70 years or more, well above previous estimates, making it one of the longest lived cartilaginous fish currently known. According to the same study, male great white sharks take 26 years to reach sexual maturity, while the females take 33 years to be ready to produce offspring. Great white sharks can swim at speeds of over 56 km/h (35 mph), and can swim to depths of 1,200 m (3,900 ft).

Mossel Bay Place in Western Cape, South Africa

Mossel Bay is a harbour town of about 130,000 people on the Southern Cape of South Africa. It is in an important tourism and farming region of the Western Cape Province. Mossel Bay lies 400 kilometres east of the country's seat of parliament, Cape Town, and 400 km west of Port Elizabeth, the largest city in the Eastern Cape Province. The older parts of the town occupy the north-facing side of the Cape St Blaize Peninsula, whilst the newer suburbs straddle the Peninsula and have spread eastwards along the sandy shore of the Bay.

Shark attack attack on a human by a shark

A shark attack is an attack on a human by a shark. Every year, around 80 unprovoked attacks are reported worldwide. Despite their relative rarity, many people fear shark attacks after occasional serial attacks, such as the Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916, and horror fiction and films such as the Jaws series. Out of more than 489 shark species, only three are responsible for a double-digit number of fatal, unprovoked attacks on humans: the great white, tiger, and bull. The oceanic whitetip has probably killed many more castaways, but these are not recorded in the statistics.

Mossel Bay Local Municipality Local municipality in Western Cape, South Africa

Mossel Bay Municipality is a municipality located in the Western Cape Province of South Africa. As of 2011 the population was 89,430.

Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916

The Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916 were a series of shark attacks along the coast of New Jersey, in the United States, between July 1 and 12, 1916, in which four people were killed and one injured. The incidents occurred during a deadly summer heat wave and polio epidemic in the United States that drove thousands of people to the seaside resorts of the Jersey Shore. Since 1916, scholars have debated which shark species was responsible and the number of animals involved, with the great white shark and the bull shark most frequently cited.

Ocean Guardian (Shark Shield) personal electromagnetic field shark deterrent device

Ocean Guardian is the manufacturer of devices that use Shark Shield Technology. The electrical wave-form used in the Shark Shield Technology is based on a technology originally invented by the KwaZulu-Natal Sharks Board of South Africa in the 1990s.

Seal Island, South Africa Island in False Bay, South Africa

Seal Island is a small land mass located 5.7 kilometres off the northern beaches of False Bay, near Cape Town in South Africa. The island is so named because of the great number of Cape fur seals that occupy it. It is 5 acres in area and home to 64,000 cape fur seals. It is also home to seabirds, and it is likely that non-marine species fly there to breed as well. The island is an outcrop of the Cape granite, and rises no more than about 4 to 6 metres above the high tide mark. The island is long and narrow – 800 by 50 metres. There is no vegetation, soil of any significance, or beach. A radar mast was built on the island during World War II by a crew who lived in prefabricated huts for the duration of the construction but this tower gradually succumbed to corrosion and was blown over in a winter storm in 1970. All that remains of it is rusty, twisted metal. There are the ruins of a few huts and other structures from the sealing and guano-collection era. Some rock inscriptions made by sealers in the 1930s are still evident.

Clifton, Cape Town Suburb of Cape Town in Western Cape, South Africa

Clifton is an affluent suburb of Cape Town, South Africa. It is an exclusive residential area and is home to the most expensive real estate in South Africa, with dwellings nestled on cliffs that have sweeping views of the Atlantic Ocean.

Shark Week is an annual, week-long TV programming block created by Tom Golden at the Discovery Channel, which features shark-based programming. Shark Week originally premiered on July 17, 1988. Featured annually, in July or early August, it was originally devoted to conservation efforts and correcting misconceptions about sharks. Over time, it grew in popularity and became a hit on the Discovery Channel. Since 2010, it has been the longest-running cable television programming event in history. Broadcast in over 72 countries, Shark Week is promoted heavily via social networks like Facebook and Twitter. Episodes are also available for purchase on services like Google Play Movies & TV/YouTube, Amazon Video, and iTunes. Some episodes are free on subscription-based Hulu.

Red Triangle (Pacific Ocean)

The Red Triangle is the colloquial name of a roughly triangle-shaped region off the coast of northern California, extending from Bodega Bay, north of San Francisco, out slightly beyond the Farallon Islands, and down to the Big Sur region, south of Monterey. The area has a very large population of marine mammals, such as elephant seals, harbor seals, sea otters and sea lions, which are favored prey of great white sharks. Around thirty-eight percent of recorded great white shark attacks on humans in the United States have occurred within the Red Triangle—eleven percent of the worldwide total. The area encompasses the beaches of the heavily populated San Francisco Bay Area, and many people enjoy surfing, windsurfing, swimming and diving in these waters.

Mike Rutzen South African conservationist and shark cage diving operator

Michael Rutzen is a South African conservationist, film maker, cage diving operator.

South African Marine Predator Lab

The South African Marine Predator Lab (SAMPLA) is a multidisciplinary research institute aimed at uncovering the lives of the marine predators of Southern Africa. SAMPLA’s primary goal is to produce accurate and essential scientific information on marine predators and create awareness on the need to understand and conserve the marine predators and ecosystems of the world.

Monty Halls is a British TV broadcaster and marine biologist best known for his BBC Great Escape series Monty Halls' Great Escape, Monty Halls' Great Hebridean Escape and Monty Halls' Great Irish Escape, during which he lived and worked in remote parts of the UK and Ireland with his dog Reuben. Halls' other TV programmes include WWII's Great Escapes , Great Barrier Reef and Lost Worlds with Leo Houlding for Discovery Channel.

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Austin Gallagher is an American marine biologist and social entrepreneur, best known for his research on sharks and his role as founder and CEO of Beneath the Waves, a non-profit organization focusing on ocean conservation. He is a National Geographic Explorer, has been the lead on more than 25 research and exploration expeditions, and his research has uncovered new species and behaviors, and has had an influence on policy for threatened species. He was a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree in the science category. He is a current fellow of the Explorers Club and a Fulbright scholar and distinguished professor.

References

  1. ↑ CAPETIMES (19 October 2011). "Public outcry over shark hunter". IOL. Retrieved April 5, 2016. ...Oceans Initiative centre in Mossel Bay and asks to speak to Enrico Gennari or Ryan Johnson, the researchers who “outed” white shark hunter Leon Bekker ...
  2. ↑ Sunday Star (5 February 2013). "Why are we so afraid of sharks?". IOL. Retrieved April 5, 2016. ...around two million people die annually from malaria, while there are around 100 000 snake-bite fatalities annually, says Mossel Bay-based shark researcher Ryan Johnson....
  3. ↑ NEWS/SOUTH-AFRICA/WESTERN-CAPE (17 October 2011). "Man caught posing with illegal great white catch". IOL. Retrieved April 5, 2016. ...Angry shark researcher Ryan Johnson of Oceans Research, based in Mossel Bay, said concerned members of the public had alerted him. While fellow researcher Enrico Gennari, director of Oceans Initiative, phoned law enforcement, Johnson rushed to the beach....
  4. 1 2 SCITECH/SCIENCE/ENVIRONMENT (23 October 2012). "Great white's journey from SA to Mozambique". IOL. Retrieved April 5, 2016. ...Ryan Johnson, a director at Oceans Research who helped initially capture and tag the shark and who named her Brenda Fassie after the late South African singer...
  5. 1 2 "Ironbound, the 12-feet long great white is hanging out around South Florida". www.msn.com. Retrieved 2019-12-28.
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