East Australian Current Corridor is an important movement area for one shark species.

Bull Sharks regularly move through this area, spanning from Gladstone in the north to Wollongong in the south, connecting subtropical waters of Queensland with temperate waters of New South Wales (Heupel et al. 2015; Espinoza et al. 2021; Smoothey et al. 2023; IMOS unpubl. data 2025). A study analysed movements of 114 Bull Sharks tracked with acoustic telemetry during 2011–2014 (Heupel et al. 2015). Around half (48%; n = 36) of the 75 individuals tagged in temperate waters moved through this area into Queensland, including four sharks that made a return trip, 13 sharks that crossed the border three times, one shark four times, and two sharks five times. About a quarter (n = 10) of the 39 individuals tagged off Townsville, outside the area, moved to subtropical waters, and only one of these (3%) continued into temperate regions (Heupel et al. 2015). Another study tracked 73 Bull Sharks tagged off Townsville and in Sydney Harbour on a total of 360 acoustic receivers along the east coast of Australia (Espinoza et al. 2021). Individuals tagged in Sydney were mainly present there in summer and autumn, while those in Townsville were mainly detected in spring and some migrated south in summer (Espinoza et al. 2021).

For an updated analysis, data were sourced from Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) – IMOS is enabled by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). It is operated by a consortium of institutions as an unincorporated joint venture, with the University of Tasmania as Lead Agent. These data include 398 Bull Sharks tracked between 2010–2025 (IMOS unpubl. data 2025). Bull Sharks were initially tagged in various locations spread along the east coast from Narooma, New South Wales in the south to Darwin, Northern Territory and the Gulf of Carpentaria, Queensland in the north. Movement segments were extracted using a speed filter of 1 km/h and only displaying movements between receiver stations that were >10 km apart. This approach means that movement segments are indicative of relatively direct and fast movements. Since most of the receivers are near the coast, and that a strict speed filter was used, these movement segments suggest that the sharks were mostly swimming along the coast.

There were 2,160,714 detections of Bull Sharks and 60,265 movement segments Australia-wide. These grouped into 7,130 unique movement segments used between 1–1,294 times by 1–85 individual Bull Sharks. The 700+ receivers were then grouped into 14 broader regions along the east coast of Australia to better assess movements within the area. The strongest connections were among nearby regions, with Sydney–Wollongong used by 295 individuals and 275 in the opposite direction, Newcastle–Sydney used by 201 individuals, and northern New South Wales to Coffs Harbour used by 146 individuals and 135 in the opposite direction. Strong connections were apparent within the eight sectors between Wollongong and Gladstone, with Gladstone to Hervey Bay (n = 34 individuals, and 37 in the opposite direction) and Hervey Bay to southeast Queensland (n = 30 and n = 44) still showing regular movements. These shorter connections also suggest that most movements were in coastal waters, with sharks being detected regularly along their migration routes. There were few movements among regions (n = 167) north of Gladstone, outside this area, despite many individuals first detected, for example, in Far North Queensland (n = 62 individuals), Townsville (n = 45), or Whitsundays (n = 26). It is possible that Bull Sharks from these northern sites also moved widely, but not within the strict speed filter that was needed to infer a movement corridor.

Most inter-regional movements occurred between December–April (84.4%). There were more southward movements detected during spring to early summer from September–January, and more northward movements during autumn from March–May. It is possible that some of the Bull Shark movements in this area are related to reproduction and/or feeding, as adult females show natal philopatry to certain rivers for pupping (Tillett et al. 2012; Lubitz 2023; Lubitz et al. 2025) but may forage widely.