Rae: In January of 1963, viewers across the United States turned on their TVs to watch a silver-haired zoologist open a new show…
Peter: The Original Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom series, featuring Marlin Perkins, became a portal into far off lands and exotic animals.
I’m wildlife expert Peter Gros and in the 1980s I joined the show as co-host.
Rae: And I’m wildlife ecologist Dr. Rae Wynn Grant. Some of my favorite memories are watching Wild Kingdom as a kid. So it’s totally surreal that now I’m working WITH Peter to tell new stories of how humans and animals can coexist.
On our TV show Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom: Protecting the Wild, Peter and I discover hope in the face of new threats. Like a wildlife crossing built over a busy Los Angeles freeway; cloning technology that’s reviving near-extinct animals; and drone footage that’s transforming how we think about great white sharks.
Peter: On this podcast, we’ll go deeper with the people behind those initiatives, find out what ignites their passion, and how we can all live a little more harmoniously with the “wild animals” in our midst.
Rae: This is Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom The Podcast.
Rae: Hey Peter, what do you think about when you hear this music from the 1975 movie Jaws?
Peter: That sound sends chills down my spine. I remember having seen that movie and looking at the exaggerated size of that aggressive shark that was out there in the ocean looking for people to consume. All of which was completely inaccurate but it still made me think for the longest time, “I don’t think I’m going to swim in the ocean.”
Rae: I mean totally, I think that Jaws made cinematic history in some ways, but it also sent probably millions of people running away from the beaches just because they're afraid of sharks.
Peter: They’ve just scared people from the idea of getting into the ocean, thinking of this mouth of razor sharp teeth. And these giant marauders in the ocean. When in fact they’re very selective about what they eat. They really don’t have much interest in people at all and we can share the ocean with them, they’re just curious. Oftentimes they’ll be near us and then just move on.
Rae: I mean the fictional sharks we see in movies and on TV shows create SO many misconceptions about the amazing, real animals that swim in our oceans. Our guest today had some similar assumptions about great white sharks until he got a unique view of them.
Carlos: More often than not, surprisingly, it’s the humans that are more curious than the sharks. See how it turned to the side? It’s looking at you, Rae. It’s looking at you.
Rae: And I was looking back. It’s mutual.
Carlos: From the drone perspective you really see how cautious…
Rae: Carlos Gauna is a drone photographer who studies shark behavior. He joined us on an episode of Wild Kingdom: Protecting the Wild.
Carlos: Oh, man. I always thought that they were just bloodthirsty, hungry, aggressive animals that are always on the go to capture whatever they like. They got big, sharp teeth and are ready to attack. Right? Whether it's another fish or a sea lion or human or whatever. I just noticed that the sharks are a complete 180 of that. They're some of the most calculated, risk averse animals I've ever seen.
Peter: Carlos’ shark journey is an unusual one - when COVID affected his regular work as a wedding photographer, he began experimenting with aerial photography off the coast of California and found himself filming the mysterious great white shark.
Using drones he’s now accumulated hundreds of hours of footage. His videos have millions of views.
Rae: We didn’t just see the footage…we actually got in our kayaks to experience it firsthand.
Peter: Dr. Rae and I put our kayaks in the surf and paddled our way out into the bay on the lookout for juveniles..
Rae: Carlos. I mean, I want to know what it was like from your perspective, because what I remember was like stress and intensity, and we were at the end of our season, and I think we had rescheduled this filming with sharks a couple of times. And so we showed up early morning on the beach in California, and you were there and you had your gear and you said, okay, well, let's see if we can find some sharks. But, you know, between me and Peter and the producers and the gear people, everyone was like, oh, no, we've got to find sharks. We got to find him. We got to find him in the first 30 minutes. We got to get out there. What was that like for you? Is that like typically how it goes and you just have to keep your cool?
Carlos: Well, when it comes to nature and when it comes to sharks, for sure, I always say there's no guarantees. And I remember talking to our producer, John, and telling him, you know, we might find a shark in ten minutes, or it might be 2 or 3 hours. We just have to be flexible. And I remember him sweating bullets. There were there for 2.5 hours. We hadn't seen a shark. And I'm like, give it, give it some time. The sun is now just starting to come out really good. Then the sharks love to come up and under that warm sun. And sure enough, we found that one shark. And then the wild thing is, you know, I'm on the radio telling you guys, you guys got to go about a quarter mile north south, if I remember correctly. And in always in the back of my head is what are these people thinking? They're going towards a apex predator that, you know, it can be unpredictable.
Rae: I can tell you what I was thinking because as you probably remember from that day, I am not very natural on the water. I get so seasick. However, I did not predict I would get seasick in a kayak. I mean, come on, like I'm in control of my own little vehicle. It was just, you know, the way it wasn't very wavy. So what I was thinking during those 2.5 hours that we were out on the water while you were on the shore looking for sharks, I was thinking, am I even going to make it? Am I even going to make it to when we find the shark? And I don't know if you know this, Carlos, but Peter was with me during this. I called it at a certain point, and I'll be a little bit graphic. I was barfing off the side of my kayak for 2.5 hours, and at a certain point I said, hey everybody, I've got to go back to shore because I otherwise I won't make it back to shore with my own muscles.
Peter: I was surprised you lasted as long as you did out there.
Rae: Oh my God.
Carlos: But the thing, that's it. That may have been what attracted the shark.
Rae: I'm useful after all.
Peter: So from now on, your nickname is bait Rae.
Rae: Bait Rae. I was just chumming the waters there, but we were. I mean, I was, like, in the thick of it. And then we heard over the walkie talkie. There's a shark, there's a shark. And we got directions back and I said, okay, for the love of conservation I am going to rally and paddle back. And Peter you know he had his strength and he was leading the way. And I remember you saw at first Carlos. But in terms of those of us on the water, Peter saw it first and it was like right in front of us and under us and behind us. And he kept saying, look, Rae, look here, look here, right there.
Peter: Here he comes right here, he’s circling back. You see him? Just to my right. Right down here.
Rae: I can’t see anything!
Peter: Look here, he’s just off your bow now. Wow, did you see the size of that?
Rae: I see it, I see it!
Peter: He’s got something off his dorsal fin
Rae: Wow! I saw it! Oh there he is, there he is.
Producer: Peter there he is
Rae: Oh my gosh!
Peter: I have to ask you this. It seemed to me he kept going around behind us. What's, is that common?
Carlos: That is very common. These these creatures are, animals that are just curious. So normally they like to go behind the subject, whether it's a kayak, whether it's another fish or another shark. What you normally see is when they encounter something, they prefer to investigate it from behind. And so what what I noticed when you guys were there is the shark would come up briefly, and I believe you could probably see its dorsal fin a couple times.
Rae: Yeah. Yeah. Which is like that's the exciting part right. That's when you feel like you're in the movies where you see the fin above the water.
Carlos: It is so surreal when you see that dorsal fin for the first time right next to you. It's amazing. I'm always in awe when it happens, and I see it there. But we know when it came behind you guys, I always tell people, if you're on a surfboard or a kayak when you don't see a shark look behind you, because more than likely that shark is going to come up behind you. And so it's a it's a good safety practice as well. If you're ever in a situation where you encounter a shark like this, look behind you and make eye contact with it. I have footage where in almost every single instance, the second that the person makes eye contact with the shark, the shark will back off.
Rae: Why is that? I can guess, but what's your opinion?
Carlos: Well, they’re opportunists. And once their cover's been blown, sometimes they just put up the white flag and will give up. Not that their intentions are to to go attack you, but they are very curious. So if you want to kind of scope something out, they prefer to do it unseen and the moment their cover is blown. Well, even, like a sea lion or other species will do it. You know, you just face them off and make. Eye contact with them, whether you're in the water or whether you're standing on a paddle board above them. It's always the case. Once you make eye contact, they're going to switch directions.
Rae: Carlos, you have this reputation that precedes you, this incredible reputation as being the person who knows how to find sharks in the water from land. Right. So you, you know, you get onto the shore, onto the sand, and you have your drone, but you also have this really cool viewing apparatus that lets you just kind of constantly be looking at this small screen, like the size of, like a small tablet. Right. Can you bring us to, like the first time you started using drones? Like, what was that? Was it on purpose? Was on accident? Like, how did you figure this out?
Carlos: Well, this is a story I've told many times, and it's one of my favorite stories. How I got started doing this. I was standing atop Point Dume on one evening. It must have been five, six years ago. And, I started with drones almost ten years ago, but I started using the drones to film whales from above because the gray whales there in Malibu, Point Dume is one of the best places in the world to see a gray well up close.
Rae: Okay. Malibu, California.
Carlos: Yeah, yeah, you can go up there right now. It's whale season. You can definitely see them. And so on that particular evening, I spent a good two, three hours filming whales. I use all the batteries on my drone. And so from the parking lot down there, you can see Point Dume. And so I left all my gear. I was out of batteries. I went up to the top of the point. You know, I'm sitting there enjoying sunset, and I notice that there's a sea lion acting weird out there. He just just jumping up and down, and then I see a big dorsal fin. And then there's another sea lion. Long story short, this great white shark, which is still one of the biggest ones I've ever seen. It made a predation attempt on a sea lion there, and, I had no way to film it.
Peter: You were then the Malibu photographer. That's how I heard of you first.
Carlos: Yeah, I was shooting weddings and landscapes and stuff like that.
Peter: Now you're a world renowned drone photographer specializing in sharks. What was that transition like?
Carlos: For me, it was very natural because, it was it's a it's always been a passion to document natural history and nature. So, to me it was like a dream come true. I had an opportunity to do what I truly love and to show a passion for something that then I think is, especially when it comes to sharks and great whites, they're very. Not. It's almost a cliche these days to say they're misunderstood. But, you know, we're coming up on the 50th anniversary of Jaws. The Jaws effect is a real thing. These sharks have always been kind of feared. Right. And so with the drone I saw, the more I film the sharks, the more I started to notice. These creatures are a lot different than I ever imagined they were.
Rae: And different. Different how you imagine they were fierce and ferocious.
Carlos: Oh man. I always thought that they were just bloodthirsty, hungry, aggressive animals that are always on the go to capture whatever they're like. They got big, sharp teeth and are ready to attack, right? Yeah, but whether it's another fish or a sea lion or human or whatever, I just noticed that the sharks are a complete. 180 of that. They're some of the most calculated. Risk averse animals I've ever seen.
Rae: That that actually. I mean, what I learned from you the day that we were filming sharks for our Wild Kingdom episode. I was learning from both of you guys because, you know, Peter had filmed Sharks Are Wild Kingdom. Plenty of times. I was learning from both of you that day that they're afraid of people, more or less. They really don't want to be around people at all. And that resonated with me so much because I study these terrestrial carnivores that are also afraid of people. Right? We hear about bears. People ask me about bear attacks, and I'm always kind of like, you know, for the number of bears that people see and encounter, there are hundreds that are around that just get out of there at the first smell of a person or sight of a person, right, that you just never see. And I was learning for you that it's not so different with sharks.
Carlos: No. And like just like the land based animals, a lot of them, they don't want anything to do with humans. They just, and rightly so, they see us as a threat. I mean, we've we've been so destructive to the natural environment that these animals live in. It's almost like we kind of deserve it in some cases, that they don't want to be around us.
Peter: Your images of proximity of great white sharks to swimmers and surfers and paddleboarders and people in the ocean has really changed attitudes about great white sharks. I mean, your your videos on YouTube and if people had an idea how often they had white sharks near them, their thinking might change that. They're just out there looking for anything in the ocean that could possibly be food. I love the way that we got to see the detail, how curious they were, how cautious they were, how sort of disinterested they were in us in any form of food. But curiosity is what brings them closer and closer to activity in the ocean. You must be very proud of the way you're affecting public attitude about sharks.
Carlos: You know, I'd like to think that a lot of people have started to change their attitude towards these apex predators. And I feel, I mean, it's an honor to be able to to be able to have that kind of influence. If it just changes one person's attitude toward toward the ocean that my job is done. And that's where I see it. The other thing is, these are creatures that really need a lot of nuance. So if there's anything that I hope footage and encounters like yours, you know, you from your experience, if there's anything, I hope it brings it's nuance to this creature because that's something we've kind of, you know, kind of forgotten in this. These these are apex predators, just like a grizzly bear. Just we have to be smart about how we approach them, about how we interact with them when when we have that opportunity. And so we have to remember they can hurt us. But at the same time, we're not on their menu. We're not something that they want to eat. But we have to remember they can they can do that. But this kind of footage just should put it in perspective, that 99.9% of the time, they don't want anything to do with us.
Rae: I grew up in California and I grew up in very, very urban spaces. I came from, you know, kind of a, I guess, typical working class black community and lived, you know, probably like 1 or 2 miles from the ocean, you know, like lived very close to wilderness but didn't experience it. And I had a great upbringing. Right. So I'm really proud of how I was raised. But I, you know, more and more I realized like, gosh, I missed out on some really cool nature encounters and experiences. And as an adult, I get that as a, you know, as a conservation scientist, as a Wild Kingdom host, I get that you get that a lot now, too. But I'm curious, how did you grow up and does that play into the experiences you have today?
Carlos: I came here from El Salvador during the civil war in the 80s. So that's how I ended up in the United States as a war refugee and lived in Midwest and Oklahoma for about ten years, and then finally moved out here because I wanted to be by the ocean. One thing that really hit home for me when I started doing this is realizing that, you know, we have roughly 17 million people down here in Southern California, all within two hours of the ocean, right? One of the most populated places in the world. Yet our backyard is one of the most biodiverse areas in the world. And so don't take that for granted. That's that's a really good thing. And I think the episode, this episode really encapsulates that because you have one of the ocean's top predators. Right there, 100 yards from shore.
Peter: It's a great point, though. It's not unusual to go 17 miles off the coast, not far from where we're filming, and you'll be the only boat anchored on the back side of Santa Cruz Island. It's just feel like you're in a really remote location and you're just not. One of the things I went to ask you that was so impressive to me is that I remember reading you filmed the actual first great White Shark Baby. Where did that happen?
Carlos: That was quite a process. It took about four years of being at the right place at the right time. Some luck, I won't. I'll put this caveat out there. The press has called it the first great white shark. But scientifically speaking, I can only say that the probability is that it's a baby great white shark. There's no precedent for it. That's what's cool about this.
Rae: Science hasn't hasn't documented the birth of a great white shark before. And so we think this is it. But we can't say for sure.
Carlos: We can't say for sure. It's only a sample of one. But I'm fortunate enough to have recorded this. What is, in all likelihood, the first newborn great white shark. Just a solid white, just beautiful little scrunched up nose. It looks like your ideal baby. Like a baby shark and rounded dorsal fins. And it's got this white like layer sloshing off. But, yeah, that happened here in the central coast of California. And it's it's one of those things where you get an opportunity to film something that's never been seen before, whether it's a newborn shark or a, a skin condition. The underlying most important part of this is a reminder that we have a lot to learn about these creatures, and in order to protect them, we have to learn about them. Right? So it's conservation at the core. I want to film another one. And if I film another one, imagine the ramifications for that. Like any, any place where there is a birth of any creature, whether it's land based, there should be a sacred place, right? A protected area. So there's conservation aspects to it that I think will will be fruitful in the future.
Carlos: Something I love about Wild Kingdom is, it's it reinforces the idea that we are merely guests in the natural world, right? Where the, the mountain or the shark nursery doesn't belong to us. It really belongs to them. And when we're there, we're guests.
Peter: And I think that's a great message. And I think it's important that as we share habitat, we've gradually developed into their habitat that we adjust our habits. I know Rae often talks about how to behave in bear country, people who are going to spend time in or around the ocean. I'm sure you speak to groups of people frequently. What's your advice?
Carlos: I always tell people the first thing you have to do, whether you're on land or whether you're it or you're in the water, is you always have to have respect and awareness for where you are. And I think if you acknowledge that you're already halfway to being safe, it's just that respect and knowing and education of what I call situational awareness.
Peter: Remember the stories we used to hear about swimming with jewelry on, or shiny objects or quick motions as new water? Those are all just sort of well….
Rae: If you have a cut on your leg and….
Peter: Is any of that fact at all?
Carlos: There are elements that can affect a shark's interest. The shiny stuff, it actually, I believe it does actually make an effect. But you know, there are things like a yellow kayak. They call it, “yum yum yellow” for a reason. The sharks, for some reason, show a tendency to want to go to yellow things.
Peter: The very first show that I did in Australia, diving with White Sharks. They took my measurements and designed me a bright yellow wetsuit.
Rae: Oh no, Peter.
Peter: I wish I'd met you well before then.
Rae: I mean I’m starting to really love sharks and so let’s change up the style of the podcast real quick. What if we did rapid fire shark facts?
Peter: Great idea, there’s lots of things about sharks that people don’t know I’ m sure we can share with them.
Rae: You might remember learning in school that instead of bones they have cartilage tissue, which is the same stuff your ears and the tip of your nose are made up of.
Peter: Adult Great White Sharks can grow to be 20 feet long, that’s the size of a bus. And typically they’ll live to around 30 years.
Rae: You're statistically more likely to get hurt by a coconut falling out of a tree than bitten by a great white shark!
Peter: Sharks are incapable of making a sound. They don’t have any vocal chords.
Rae: Sharks have little pores on their snouts that sense electric pulses in the water, which tells them that something alive is nearby.
Peter: Even though sharks have been around for millions of years there are many species of sharks that are threatened due to overfishing from humans and changes in our oceans’ temperatures. As apex predators in the oceans’ ecosystems sharks are essential to the oceans’ health and, in turn, our own. It’s our goal to shed light on some of the misconceptions that surround these incredible creatures and educate people as to how fascinating and important they are. If we protect wildlife today we can ensure magical moments in the wild kingdom for future generations.
Carlos: Sharks can be scary, but there's nothing scarier than a planet devoid of sharks. Because if there's no sharks, there's likely not going to be any humans either.
Rae: Join us next week on the podcast when we talk to Beth Pratt. Her work on behalf of the mountain lion known as P-22 convinced the people of Los Angeles to do the unthinkable and build a wildlife crossing bridge over 10 lanes of busy freeway…
Beth: Putting myself in his shoes or paws, whatever you want to call it, and looking what he was facing and his other cats were facing, and knowing we could do something, it just kind of became a moral imperative.
Rae: That’s next time on Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom The Podcast
CREDITS
Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom The Podcast is a production of Pineapple Street Studios and Mutual of Omaha.
Our Senior Producer is Stephen Key.
Producers are Xandra Ellin and Jenny Van Soelen.
Associate Producer is Lisa Cerda.
Editor is Darby Maloney.
Executive Producers are Bari Finkel, Gabrielle Lewis, and Jen Wulf.
Pineapple’s Head of Sound & Engineering is Raj Makhija . Senior Audio Engineers are Marina Paiz, Davy Sumner, Javi Cruces, and Pedro Alvira. Additional engineering by Rob Miller and Jason Richards.
This Episode was mixed by Davy Sumner.
Production Music courtesy of Epidemic Sound and Hearst Media Production Group.
Episode Clips courtesy of Hearst Media Production Group.
Fact checking by Justine Daum.
Marketing and Promotion by Emily Poeschl
This podcast is hosted by me, Dr. Rae Wynn Grant.
And me, Peter Gros.
Special thanks to Katelyn Williams, Sophie Radmilovich, and Stephanie Diaz
Today’s episode is based on the Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom series created by Don Meier.
Our next episode will be out in a week. Make sure to listen on the Audacy app, or wherever you get your podcasts.
