Hammerhead sharks are vanishing from their mountain homes in the Gulf of California, divers say
A school of scalloped hammerhead sharks (Sphyrna lewini) near Malpelo Island in Colombia. (Image credit: Gerard Soury via Getty Images)Hammerhead sharks have seemingly disappeared from two underwater mountains in the southwestern Gulf of California, and fishing is likely to blame, a new study has found. Researchers looked at observations from divers over the last 50 years and found that scalloped hammerhead sharks (Sphyrna lewini) experienced a 97% decline at the El Bajo seamount and a 100% decline at the Las Animas seamount — both off the coast of Mexico — between the 1970s and 2010s.Study lead author Kathryn Ayres, a research scientist at the nongovernmental organization Beneath The Waves, told Live Science in an email that she was "saddened but not surprised" by the results.Scalloped h...