Inside Shark Week 2026: Jesse Colaizzi on Alien Sharks Untamed America
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
Release Date: 07/27/2026
37 Shark and Ray Species Documented in Benin: Inside West Africa’s Shark Research
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
37 shark and ray species documented in Benin, the result of more than 15 years of fieldwork by fisheries biologist Dr. Houangninan Midinoudewa. He has built Benin’s first dedicated shark and ray research program from almost nothing on the Gulf of Guinea. On this episode of the Beyond Jaws podcast, Andrew Lewin and shark scientist Dr. David Ebert explore what he’s found and why West Africa is the next frontier for elasmobranch research. Houangninan shares how Jacques Cousteau’s films inspired his career, how he recorded shark and ray landings at Benin’s harbors from dawn until midnight,...
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How Carlos Gauna's Drone Revealed California's Hidden White Sharks
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
What flying drones over great whites really revealed is that far more white sharks live off Southern California beaches than anyone's records showed, often within a few yards of swimmers who never know they're there. Carlos Gauna, known online as The Malibu Artist, has spent years documenting them from above. It started with a shot he missed: sitting atop Point Dume at sunset without his camera or phone, he watched a large white shark chase a sea lion right below him. He had been flying his drone over gray whales, and from that night on he went looking for sharks. Today the photographer and...
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How a Three-Month Trip Turned Into a Career in Sharks
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
Dr. Clova Mabin never set out to become a shark educator. She grew up on Scotland's windswept, freezing beaches with no TV until she was 13, which meant a childhood spent outside with her nature-loving father, and an honors degree in zoology from the University of Edinburgh that ended up focused on bird behavior, not the ocean, simply because no marine supervisor was available. A three-month marine conservation placement in Madagascar gave her a first taste of the field. A chance meeting with a South African at a Scottish aquarium turned what was meant to be a three-month trip to South Africa...
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Inside Shark Biology and Conservation, Second Edition
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
Every shark course needs a bible, and this one just got a second edition. Five years after the first Shark Biology and Conservation: Essentials for Educators, Students, and Enthusiasts landed on shelves and in classrooms, co-authors Dan Abel, Dean Grubbs, Tristan Guttridge, and Josh Moyer rebuilt it from the ground up: new chapters, new contributed essays from researchers around the world, and two co-authors who weren't part of the original book at all. Three of the four join Andrew and Dave (Dean's internet dropped him from the call, but he's credited throughout) to talk about why a book that...
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Saving Ghana's Guitarfish: Inside West Africa's First Shark Science Program
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
Dr. Issah Seidu didn't set out to become West Africa's first dedicated shark and ray scientist. He started his career studying dragonflies, damselflies, amphibians, and even elephants and crocodiles as a terrestrial wildlife biologist in Ghana, a country whose university programs, like most in the region, simply didn't study marine species. That changed on a visit to his uncle, a fisherman in a coastal community, where he watched sharks and rays being landed and sold on the beach and realized nobody in Ghana, or almost anywhere in West Africa, was studying them at all. Today he's the founder...
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Walking Sharks and the Great Zebra vs. Leopard Shark Debate with Dr. Chris Dudgeon
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
Dr. Chris Dudgeon has spent more than two decades studying some of the ocean's strangest and least understood sharks, from the reef-walking Hemiscyllium species of Papua New Guinea and Indonesia to the shape-shifting zebra shark that spends its youth striped and its adulthood spotted. In this episode, hosts Andrew Lewin and Dr. David Ebert sit down with Chris, a senior researcher who bridges evolutionary biology, population genetics, and applied conservation, to unpack why a single species can carry two completely different common names, how a newly discovered walking shark came to be named...
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Walking Sharks Explained: A PhD Candidate's Path to a New Species
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
Walking sharks are one of the strangest small predators on the reef: pectoral fins built for crawling across coral flats at low tide, distributions so narrow some species live in a single bay, and a family tree that's still being filled in. In this episode, Andrew Lewin and Dr. David Ebert are joined by Jess Blakeway, a PhD candidate at the University of the Sunshine Coast, whose research on the distribution, ecology, and biology of walking sharks (genus Hemiscyllium) in Papua New Guinea has already led to a new species discovery. Jess walks through her path from volunteering with sea turtles...
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Inside Shark Week 2026: Jesse Colaizzi on Alien Sharks Untamed America
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
It's Shark Week season again, and Andrew Lewin and Dr. David Ebert are joined for the third year running by Jesse Colaizzi, an award-winning television documentary producer, senior editor, and director of photography who works closely with Forrest Galante. Jesse pulls back the curtain on how a Shark Week episode actually comes together, from scouting locations to the final cut. Jesse joins the show remotely from Gujarat, India, where he is showrunning and editing Vantara's Sanctuary Stories, before turning to his newest project, Alien Sharks: Untamed America, premiering Wednesday, July 29th on...
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She Spent Years Tracking Sharks in Crocodile-Infested Rivers
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
Dr. Julia Constance is back on Beyond Jaws, and this time she's joining hosts Andrew Lewin and Dr. David Ebert as Dr. Constance. Julia returns fresh off completing her PhD on the natural mortality and movement ecology of two of the world's least understood sharks: the speartooth shark and the northern river shark, both found almost nowhere outside northern Australia and southern Papua New Guinea. Using a long-running acoustic telemetry dataset built by her supervisor since 2013, Julia tracked around 200 tagged sharks across Northern Territory river systems, some for up to a decade, to...
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What Does a Camera Have to Do With Saving Sharks?
Beyond Jaws: Exploring Shark Science and Conservation
For decades, stunning shark photographs have shaped the way millions of people think about these misunderstood predators. But behind every unforgettable image is a story that rarely gets told. In this episode of Beyond Jaws, we sit down with Manique Fallows to explore the passion, patience, and purpose behind a life dedicated to sharks. Monique shares how photography became more than a way to capture wildlife. It became a powerful tool for conservation, storytelling, and helping people connect with animals they often fear. We also talk about her work as an author, her experiences in the field,...
info_outlineIt's Shark Week season again, and Andrew Lewin and Dr. David Ebert are joined for the third year running by Jesse Colaizzi, an award-winning television documentary producer, senior editor, and director of photography who works closely with Forrest Galante. Jesse pulls back the curtain on how a Shark Week episode actually comes together, from scouting locations to the final cut.
Jesse joins the show remotely from Gujarat, India, where he is showrunning and editing Vantara's Sanctuary Stories, before turning to his newest project, Alien Sharks: Untamed America, premiering Wednesday, July 29th on Discovery. Built around America's 250th anniversary, the episode traces a journey across the country in search of cryptic and lesser known sharks, including white sharks off Diablo Canyon, a California horn shark, a swell shark located after months of searching, a guitar fish, bonnethead sharks, a swarm of blacktip sharks, a rediscovered tagged sawfish with researcher Dean Grubbs, and a basking shark in Cape Cod Harbor.
Along the way, Jesse and the hosts dig into what editors notice that scientists and viewers often miss: coordinated hunting behavior in sharks, how white sharks react to a drone's shadow on the water, the technical tricks used to slow down fast-moving animals on camera, and how years of watching raw footage trained Jesse to read animal behavior the way a birder reads bird behavior. Jesse also shares stories from filming rescued and rehabilitated animals in India, the discipline it takes to run multiple shows at once, and why this year's episode leans into American wildlife, from bison to elk to the Statue of Liberty, rather than the usual landmarks.
Key Takeaways
- Jesse Colaizzi is an award-winning producer, senior editor, and director of photography who works with Forrest Galante on Shark Week and Discovery Channel programming, including Extinct or Alive and Alien Sharks.
- Alien Sharks: Untamed America premieres Wednesday, July 29th and is built around an America 250 theme, spotlighting cryptic and lesser-known native sharks across the country.
- The team tracked white sharks, a California horn shark, leopard sharks, a swell shark, a guitar fish, bonnethead sharks, blacktip sharks, a sawfish tagged in partnership with researcher Dean Grubbs, and a basking shark in Cape Cod Harbor.
- Editors and camera crews rely on subtle behavioral cues, frame rate tricks, and instinct to capture usable footage of fast-moving, unpredictable animals in the wild.
- White sharks have been observed reacting to the shadow of a filming drone, a small but telling example of how visual and behavioral cues shape what ends up on screen.
- Sharks display coordinated group behavior when hunting, echoing patterns Dr. David Ebert has documented in his own research on pack hunting.
- Jesse is currently based in Gujarat, India, working on Vantara's Sanctuary Stories, a series focused on rescued and rehabilitated animals and the conditioning process used to care for them.
- This year's episode centers the Statue of Liberty and iconic American wildlife such as bison and elk instead of typical landmark imagery, offering a nature-first take on the America 250 theme.
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Dave:
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