23 April 2012 – Bull Shark caught in Reunion Island

1 Comment

1. Angel

   Posted on April 24, 2012 at 6:04 am

   This is nonsense.

   Out in the middle of the Indian Ocean, they think they can catch the sharks that are responsible from the last 2-3 fatal attacks.

   They know that they can not do that. And we all know that killing even a few thousand sharks will not solve the problem.

   The real deal is well known by the locals. I had an interesting conversation with a well known French underwater film maker during a shark dive in Mexico.

   I asked him to help me around the French Polynesia for a shark dive, contacts etc. And he said that I do not need to go that far away, I can have a better shark dive in Reunion.

   We talked about this for hours to plan a trip, when, how, locations, boat and equipment etc. And when we talked about the rarity of the attacks, he said; that is the place more sharks attacked people than any other place. They just did not talk about it. This conversation was back in 2006 just 8 years ago. Last years they had fatal attacks and they want to stop it. How ? What they think is the easiest way, killing sharks. Actually this may be the hardest way.

   They brought in experts from South Africa to Reunion, who can not stop the attacks no matter what they tried in their homeland. They have been using nets forever in some beaches. They have one of the largest fishing fleets if not the largest in the whole continent. They killed more sharks than anyone in Africa for years. I think everyone should understand the facts. We are doing something wrong to prevent the attacks. It is very clear by now that killing is not the solution.

   It is like keep giving aspirin to a dying patient. It just did not work. We need to recognize the facts, make a right diagnostic and than treat the patient accordingly.

   The real question is why? Why are these animals attack humans? We have every kind of statistics from the color of the suit to time of the day. Do they help in any way? I doubt.

   There are thousands of people around the globe working on sharks, experts to professors, dive operators, professionals, film makers, life savers. And nobody has a clue? No one has something that actually works? A solution that will stop the attacks and save the sharks at the same time? Well that is hard to perceive and digest. With all we have in terms of shark people and technology, humanity can not find a solution.

   We are killing over one hundred million sharks a year for almost over a decade and the number of fatal attacks increase? More people are killed. And we are stupid enough to think that killing sharks will solve the problem for good! That is lame. Any person that has the basic algebra knowledge will tell you that, killing will not solve this problem. And for the people that are killed by sharks that did not work at all. None of the victims deserved to die. The sharks did not deserve to be killed. There must be another way. There is always another way. We all should think about it.

   We must have discussions, brain storms, meetings, groups working on it with all available resource of knowledge and information. Maybe experts from all over the world should come together for meetings just for this purpose. They should include, locals, sponge hunters, small fisherman, lifesavers, even tribal people that lived with this fact for centuries. Every bit of knowledge is important in brain storming. A villager from a forgotten village may well have what we are looking for.

   We know more of their breeding patterns than why they attack. We have thousands of scientific papers published every year on god knows what about sharks but not even a single one is published on why they attack. I personally think, if we can not answer the question “Why”, we will never have a solid solution.

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