In February, a surfer was mauled by a shark off the Southland coast.
The man was bitten three times, reportedly by a great white, while he was surfing at Porpoise Bay, near Curio Bay.
In December, a junior Southland doctor made headlines around the world when he stitched up his own wound after being attacked by a shark while fishing near Cosy Nook, off the south coast.
James Grant fought off the shark, believed to be a sevengill, before he treated his wound and his mates took him to the hospital.
In January, a shoal of eight sharks forced the beach at Coromandel holiday hot-spot Pauanui to close.
Over the New Year there were reported sightings of a 4.5m great white in the Waitemata Harbour.
A family fishing from a 6m vessel in the harbour near Te Atatu, West Auckland, hooked the predator on a fishing line.
The shark was reported to have jumped high out of the water, snapping the line.
That sighting led the Department of Conservation to issue a warning to those fishing, kayaking and kite-surfing in the area.
A week before Christmas there was another sighting of a great white breaching the water at Okakari Pt near Leigh.
In the last fatal shark attack in New Zealand waters, Auckland film-maker Adam Strange, 47, was killed at Muriwai on Auckland's west coast in February 2013.
