Oliver Scheele is a drone pilot based in Australia, and he recently captured footage of a scalloped hammerhead shark that had him beyond excited. The funny footage, which shows the moment the hammerhead briefly eats a leaf and then realizes it made a horrible mistake, is delighting the online community.
“This hammer was hunting on the high tide, so quick . . . check it out eating a leaf and spitting it out,” Scheele wrote in his Instagram post sharing the footage. “I could not hold in my excitement during this sighting I could barely fly the drone.”
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Scheele calls this an “amazing encounter” and expresses his hope that the shark stays safe from humans. Scalloped hammerheads face threats in the wild such as commercial fishing. The shark fin trade particularly threatens these sharks, because perpetrators slice off the sharks’ fins and leave the animals to die. NOAA says two population segments of the scalloped hammerhead shark are endangered and two are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
Notably, these animals are not vegetarians. They prefer bony fishes, stingrays, squids, and crustaceans.
Watch as a hammerhead eats a leaf and regrets it immediately:
Header image by wildestanimal via Getty