Whale watching enthusiast Marsha Devot has seen a wide range of wildlife in the past two years, as she’s taken 60 or so ocean trips off Dana Point.

But one creature has eluded her.

“I still have not seen the elusive great white shark,” the 61-year-old marine life fanatic said.

So, last weekend, she was first in line aboard on a new type of ocean charter – shark tours.

Run by Dana Wharf Whale Watching, the tours are a new response to a huge jump in the number of shark sightings reported by whale tour captains, fishing boat operators and others.

And this summer, as long as the ocean remains overheated from El Niño conditions in the Pacific, the company will test to see if there are enough sharks in the ocean off Orange County to be tour-worthy.

Sharks aren’t as easy to find as whales or dolphin. They’re fish, for one thing, so they don’t have to breach the water’s surface for air.

For some observers, that’s part of the intrigue.

“There’s always anticipation,” Devot said. “Sometimes you get disappointed. These are wild animals.”

Go to the drop-off

On a recent day, the boat left Dana Point Harbor for a two-hour tour to search for sharks. They headed out toward the continental shelf, about three miles from the shore, where the ocean deepens abruptly and an abundance of wildlife lives.

“When you’re looking for biodiversity, you go to where the drop-off is,” Devot said. “The current brings nutrients up, which brings animals that feed.”

Dana Wharf captain Frank Brennan dropped chum in the water, eventually luring a 5-foot hammerhead shark close to the boat.

Brennan said hammerheads are shy creatures.

“You have to … creep up on them if you want to get a good look.”

Devot, among others, was pleased.

“It was fun,” she said. “We stayed with the hammerhead for a little while. It came up a few times.”

Hammerhead sharks are a tropical species and aren’t often seen near Orange County. But in the past two years, as El Niño conditions have warmed the water, they’ve become semi-regulars.

Brennan said that last year, when the water reached the mid- to upper 70s in late summer – a few weeks later than this summer – hammerheads were seen almost daily.

Eventually, the animal spotted during the recent tour disappeared into the deep.

As often happens during charter tours, the trip to see sharks included a sea encounter that wasn’t expected – a glimpse of a rare-to-the-area pelagic stingray, the only species of stingray that lives in the open ocean.

Something new

“Those pelagic rays aren’t that common,” said biologist Eric Yee. “I’m always excited when I see something new. Sometimes, quality outweighs quantity.”

Pelagic stingrays typically live in open ocean waters at 66 degrees or more. Yee said there have been reports of other warm-water species – mako sharks up and down the coast and thresher sharks near Laguna Beach.

Ryan Lawler, owner of another tour boat company – Newport Coastal Adventure – came across two hammerheads while on a fishing trip about two weeks ago.

He captured one of the sightings on video, showing an 8-foot-long animal about 10 miles offshore.

“They are definitely filtering in,” Lawler said of the hammerheads. “It seems like they are coming back.”

In past years, not including the warmer El Niño years, hammerheads have come only as close as San Clemente Island. They come into local waters when temperatures get about 75 degrees.

Lawler predicted the number of sightings will continue to rise this month through September, when local ocean temperatures typically peak.

Great whites

Other sharks aren’t so shy. Last April, Brennan got drone video of a great white lingering near San Clemente Pier. And for the past two years, great whites have been spotted from Seal Beach through San Onofre.

It’s unclear whether warm water is why the region suddenly is a go-to spot for great whites.

Typically, great whites are born nearby and linger in parts of Southern California for several months, then move to deeper, colder water as they grow, usually by the start of winter.

But they’ve been sticking around locally over the past two years, getting bigger and eating more – and changing what was believed to be the normal pattern for the species.

Recently, a 15-foot female great white was tracked traveling from San Francisco to Newport Beach.

Local lifeguards have put out sonars to detect tagged sharks (such as the animal from San Francisco), something that is helping scientists learn more about great white behavior.

In mid June – the same month a shark, probably a great white, bit a woman swimming off Corona del Mar – an estimated 10- to 12-foot great white was spotted a few miles off Dana Point by passengers on a Dana Wharf boat.

Observers were thrilled to see the big fin slice the ocean’s surface.

Not so scary

That sighting sparked an idea.

Dana Wharf manager Donna Kalez said she sent out an e-mail to customers about a month ago hinting at shark tours.

She was surprised by the high response; about 50 people wrote back, some with the subject line “I love sharks!”

“That’s how we knew we were onto something,” she said.

It could mean a new business venture for the whale watching and fishing charter company. If all goes well, if passengers like the outings and, of course, if enough sharks come out to be seen, the company might offer four-hour excursions.

A mako shark made news last weekend after it leaped out of the ocean near a fishing boat. And thresher sharks have become a common site off Orange County.

Brennan said a longer trip would make his job of finding the sharks easier. He’d like to have the time to travel down to San Onofre to see if they can get up close to great whites known to live in the area.

Devot hopes the new adventure will educate the public about sharks – and maybe dispel some of the myths generated by shark-as-enemy movies like “Jaws.”

“The upside of ‘Jaws,’ it has everybody curious about sharks. That led to research and that led to funding,” Devot said.

“If there is a good side to what resulted from ‘Jaws,’ is that it got us thinking and concerned about the role sharks play.”

That intrigue was apparent from those who got a glimpse of the hammerhead that popped up for a few minutes into that inaugural trip.

“It’s just not something you think you’re ever going to see, at least not close,” Devot said. “I’m hoping that as they continue this project, we’ll get a little more familiar with where the hot spots are for sharks, and we’ll try it again.”

Contact the writer: lconnelly@ocregister.com