Does diving while on period attract sharks?

[Jai Bar]

According to one of the videos, sharks can't or don't distinguish between types of mammalian blood. One of the videos also showed them lining up behind a steady drip of cow's blood – and I kind of suspect few sharks regularly feed on them either.

Many years ago- more than I care to admit- was trekking with a couple of friends along South African coast. We were told to cross the rivers only during low tide, the claim was that at high tide Zambezi sharks venture up the rivers to feed on occasional cattle or whatever/whoever they find in the rivers.


Never saw any Zambezis in rivers, only in the sea, so don't know if it was myth or whether the locals knew what they were talking about.

 

[Hoyden]

As someone who dove in a public aquarium for just over 20 years as an adult female, I can personally verify that at least some blacktip reef sharks, sandbars, nurse sharks, bonnet heads, sand tigers, black nose sharks, leopard sharks, horn sharks, swell sharks, tasseled wobegongs, ornate wobegongs, and chain cat sharks don't care about human menstrual blood.

 

[34109411]

Sorry for this question, but I have already heard that one drop of blood can attract sharks. Thus, if a woman dives when it's that time of month, is there a possibility sharks could be attracted to the area?

yes they will eat them alive.

 

[34109411]

As someone who dove in a public aquarium for just over 20 years as an adult female, I can personally verify that at least some blacktip reef sharks, sandbars, nurse sharks, bonnet heads, sand tigers, black nose sharks, leopard sharks, horn sharks, swell sharks, tasseled wobegongs, ornate wobegongs, and chain cat sharks don't care about human menstrual blood.

 

[34109411]

ahhh a women of experience speaking! Thank you to enlightened us on this very important subject.

 

[Dapper Dan]

The way I understand, is blood from the mensus is "dead" blood, and sharks are not interested

That was the determination of the MARSOC research when they were doing studies at LeJune to determine if women operators on their period would endanger a Raider or SEAL team by attracting sharks. Some reason or another, sharks can smell the difference in "dead blood" and "live blood" and they aren't interested in dead blood.

I believe that study was done about 8 years ago when there was the big controversy over whether women should be allowed in military combat positions.