Great White Sharks Questions!!

[v4nity]

i do not like sharks. its the look of them. they are scary!

 

[carlcz]

Farallon Islands, off SF area have a resident reasonably constant population of large (+10-12 ft) Great Whites yearly, while Gaansbaai, South Africa is a hot spot between May through August [ went there ~3 years ago in June/July and had sharks on virtually every dive], possibly into September and October (more rarely). Tours and cage diving can be done in both locations.

 

[micknewton]

Does anyone know what benefit they provide for the ocean?

Help make the human race better by eating slow swimmers and pesky surfers?

 

[riguerin]

i do not like sharks. its the look of them. they are scary!

Sharks are one of the most amazing creatures that you'll encounter in the ocean. They posses a grace, power, and sheer presence that is awesome to behold. As others have mentioned, Great Whites posses little real threat to divers. They're out there ... so there is always an element of risk, anytime that you enter their domain. However, even attacks on surfers, which are highly publicized, are fairly rare. We've had numerous sighting of Great Whites here at San Onofre (a very popular surfing beach) over the past few years and have never had a single attack (finding some to wood to knock on )

You've mentioned that you'll be moving to Costa Rica soon. While, still in technically in their range, I do not believe that they are found in high concentrations there. Instead, White-Tip reef sharks (a fairly docile species) are very common. You may also encounter the occasional Bull shark. Hammerheads are also known to congregate at the Coco Islands, during certain times of the year. You're gonna love it there ! Good luck.

 

[Groundhog246]

Thanks Bill and Packhorse. Wow, that is incredible that we could slaughter so many in just a year. I had no idea the number was so high.

A very large number are taken, their fins removed and then their dumped back in to drown. All so some folks can have Shark Fin Soup. And then there's the ones who die as by-catch. Not wanted, they're caught along with other 'desirable' species and again just dumped. Only a very tine percentage are taken as whole fish for food.

I read an article late last year, that blames a good portion of the decline of coral reefs on the loss of Sharks. When you remove large number of the top level predators, it allows the fish populations they eat to bloom. Some of those are species that dine of corals, hard and soft. At first glance it sounded silly that killing sharks would damage corals, but by the time I finished reading, it made a great deal of sense. Especially if you're familiar with how much damage deer and other animals are doing to farm crops in areas where their natural predators have been killed off.

I have yet to have the privilege of seeing a shark while diving, but I look forward to the opportunity and keep my camera close at hand.

 

[Jim Ernst]

the march issue of DIVE TRAINING MAG has a GREAT article on the demise of sharks, article is titled CLOSING THE JAWS, this story tells of the impact we have had on the shark population and the bad adverse effect it is haveing on our oceans and the fact that if some very drastic changes arent made we will soon cause them to become nonexistant, extinct!!! great article lot of facts!! take a look if you havent. sharks are magnifisent creatures and we and our oceans need them!!!

 

[Jim Ernst]

the march issue of DIVE TRAINING MAG has a GREAT article on the demise of sharks, article is titled CLOSING THE JAWS, this story tells of the impact we have had on the shark population and the bad adverse effect it is haveing on our oceans and the fact that if some very drastic changes arent made we will soon cause them to become nonexistant, extinct!!! great article lot of facts!! take a look if you havent. sharks are magnifisent creatures and we and our oceans need them!!! i finally got to dive with them 3 all in 5 -10 away from me

 

[Jcsgt]

One of the coolest things I've done is to go on a shark dive in Roatan. We were diving with over a dozen Caribbean Reef Sharks in about 70'. They would glide by us, roll their eyes in our direction (probably seeing who had the food) then soar right on past. They had no real interest in us, only the shark wrangler. They are magnificent, graceful creatures.

This does not mean that I completely trust them. Like any wild animal, especially predators, you still have to be on your guard and use good common sense.

 

[Jim Ernst]

some how i have double posted here !!! could you please remove this and post no#27, post 26-27 are a double. thank you very much in advance. jim

 

[pitah]

every year more than 100 million sharks are slaughtered. Many just for their fins. By 2017 nearly 20 species of shark will be extinct. When we stop buying shark, they'll stop fishing it... www.bite-back.com


download the pdf file with frequently asked questions about sharks (english version)
http://www.geocities.com/oceanosdivecon/ENG-4LOGOS.pdf

some shark links
http://www.geocities.com/shark_noextinction/sharksnoextinction2.html