I'd think buoyancy control would be more crucial in a shallow tank and it's certainly more difficult to master while you're shallow. I suspect when you make your 5th dive, your buoyancy control will be much better than a typical diver at that point.
My first shark bite!!
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I'd think buoyancy control would be more crucial in a shallow tank and it's certainly more difficult to master while you're shallow. I suspect when you make your 5th dive, your buoyancy control will be much better than a typical diver at that point.
aubie85
Contributor
So.....I was gearing up for my weekly feeding dive at work yesterday & I decided (on a whim) to borrow a shortyfor the dive since I've been considering buying one. I suit up, purge the hooka, don my mask & gloves, grab the food bags and sink into my second home.
All is well, but I have one of those nagging "something is going to go wrong" feelings in the back of my head. I dismiss the "ESP" sensation as stress and a busy day and go about my business. The fish, sharks, rays & eels follow me to the display window....where I wave at the crowd, settle in on the bottom, nudge the trigger fish away from my booties (they attack your feet), pet the ray & sharks, and wait for all my fishy friends to settle down.
Everyone assumes their positions, I open the bags and the feeding proceeds. A piece of fish to you, stop biting my booties, and a piece of fish to you, oh here comes the eel, and a piece of fish to you, let go of my glove, and a piece of fish to you, get out of my hair, and a piece of fish to you.....and then it happens.....
.........One of our banded bamboo sharks latches on to my arm right below my gloves. OUCH!!!! :11: :11: :11: :11: Gut reaction is to jump up while screaming like a pansy, sissy girl and to beat the shark on the head until it lets go....gnawing, gnawing... But as I'm kneeling in front of the public & we are doing "our duty" to dispell the myths that sharks are....gnawing, gnawing....thoughtless killers, all I can do is sit there with this 3 foot shark....gnawing, gnawing....attached to my arm and wait. I wait, and I wait. I wait for what seems like an eternity, but I know it was less than 30 seconds. Finally, the gnawing stops & he lets me loose. And what does he get as his reward for letting me go? That's right....a piece of fish.
The rest of the dive proceeds as normal. Everyone's fed; everyone's happy. I vaccuum the substrate, I scrub the window....all the while thinking to myself....
"Do NOT buy the shorty. Do NOT buy the shorty. Wear your full suit, you idiot."
So now here I sit, nursing the world's biggest hickey on my arm, with the memory of the sensation of gnawing, gnawing...& wondering where my next "war wound" will be placed. Of course, my kids think I'm the coolest mom in the world because I survived a shark bite & they can't wait to tell all their friends. Of course, they don't care that it was a banded bamboo shark......they just know it was a SHARK. LOL.
Wow! It doesn't matter what kind of shark it was. It is just great that you are safe, you handled the situation well
I am a new diver, and I am always thinking about the proper situation when coming across a shark. I came across one in Cancun, and remained motionless(not sure if that was the right thing to do, but nothing happened ) Could someone provide me with some shark advice? I am not sure if this correct, but I believe that when there is a shark around, it is best to remain calm. I don't think panicking and trying to out swim a shark would be a great idea. I have also heard that if a shark approaches you and tries to attack, the best thing to do is punch it in the nose to distract them.
It's awesome that you work with sharks, but is it possible to get 'too comfortable' around them?
sharky60
Contributor
I miss my feeding dives at the Dallas Aquarium
the tank had a structural problem:11:and was cut down for a new tidal touch tank, to be opening soon with small sharks and rays in it.
never had a bamboo shark latch on to me, but a our 40lb. Pacu's would occationally try to go after a finger if you didn't keep them to yourself.
thankx for sharing
the tank had a structural problem:11:and was cut down for a new tidal touch tank, to be opening soon with small sharks and rays in it.
never had a bamboo shark latch on to me, but a our 40lb. Pacu's would occationally try to go after a finger if you didn't keep them to yourself.
thankx for sharing
Buoyancy is a completely different game in this situation - no bc! It can be hard to get down the first 4 feet, because you don't want to overweight so much you can't get back up (no bc to inflate and no fins). The small, shallow tank I used to dive in (I've since moved) was also about 12 ft deep, and had nothing besides the acrylic at the top 4 ft.
I've been popped on the head by a nurse shark (thankfully wearing a hood) and bitten by two puffers. I agree the puffers are really the ones to look out for! Bikini Bottom, you did real well to react so calmly especially in front of an audience. It is fun when the kids scream "shark" so loudly you can hear it in the water!
sharky60
Contributor
we didn't use BC's either on our dives in Dallas. the tank was only 8' deep so swimming wasn't an option.
I'd wear 8lbs. on each leg and up to 20lbs. on my weight belt. with the extra bouyancy from the full faced mask, this much weight was just about right to be able to secure me to the floor so I could walk around the tank under control to clean it, or to plant myself in one place for the feeding dives.
I'd wear 8lbs. on each leg and up to 20lbs. on my weight belt. with the extra bouyancy from the full faced mask, this much weight was just about right to be able to secure me to the floor so I could walk around the tank under control to clean it, or to plant myself in one place for the feeding dives.
Shawley
Contributor
wow sounds like a great job love the post
dgalvan123
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nice tale!
I'm a volunteer diver at the Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific, and have been bit a couple times by our leopard sharks and once by our zebra shark. Never out of malice, of course, just because it was feeding time and the shark would miss the piece of squid I was handing him and get my finger instead.
Leopard sharks:
They get up to ~40 lbs, maybe 6 ft long maximum. The only sharks in our aquarium that we divers feed by hand. They do have teeth, but they are tiny and usually don't penetrate our gloves when they accidentally get us. One time one of them thought he had a smelt, but actually had my finger. He mashed down hard and his teeth got into my skin next to my finger nail. The pressure actually smarted quite a bit, but I didn't really feel the cutting. He let up once he realized his mistake, and I finished the feed as usual, only noticing the cut (it wasn't very deep) after I pulled my glove off after the dive.
We call our leopards "the puppies" because feeding them is like kneeling down and feeding a bunch of puppies that jump all over you. The leopards weeve in and out, between our legs, around our mid-section, and sometimes go through the loops in our regulator hoses. One time one of them made a pass at the food bucket, then continued up so that his mouth was right up against my cheek. He sensed my regulator hose and bit, probably thinking it was a fish. Of course, when these guys get ahold of something that gives resistance, their first instinct is to shake it like a terrier. He did, yanking the regulator mouthpiece out of my mouth. I was surprised, but had been warned by other divers at the aquarium that this could happen, so I stayed calm, waited the couple seconds it took for the leopard shark to realize his mistake and let the reg go, and put the reg back in my mouth and continued the feed. It was actually sort of a fun experience in a way. Of course, the aquarium guests watching the feed were slack-jawed.
The zebra sharks in our Tropical Reef exibit aren't fed by hand by the divers. The aquarists feed them from the surface using a long pole. However, we think one of the divers on one of the shifts has started giving them a piece or two during the feed (a big no-no!), because one of the zebras has started coming at our feed bucket trying to get a snack. These sharks are heftier than the leopards: they can get ~7-9 feet and ~150 lbs. Generally, when they come over hoping for a morsel, we just gently but firmly push them away, putting our gloved hands on the top of their heads. Once in a while, though, they will grab the neoprene cover on the top of our feed buckets and shake, ripping it off the bucket. One time a zebra grasped my elbow (we always wear full 5 mm wetsuits) and mouthed it a bit before letting go. She didn't really bite down very hard, so I figure she was just testing to see if she had got a piece of food. Another time a fellow diver on another shift had the same thing happen, only this time the zebra bit down and ripped a decent chunk of neoprene off the wetsuit. The diver was unharmed.
Strange as it may sound, getting mouthed by these sharks in the aquarium has made me even more comfortable around similar sized sharks in the open ocean. I think it's because I get a feeling of "eh, it's not all that bad" when I think about being accidentally bitten. Of course, that doesn't apply to the big fellows, but there you go.
I'm a volunteer diver at the Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific, and have been bit a couple times by our leopard sharks and once by our zebra shark. Never out of malice, of course, just because it was feeding time and the shark would miss the piece of squid I was handing him and get my finger instead.
Leopard sharks:
They get up to ~40 lbs, maybe 6 ft long maximum. The only sharks in our aquarium that we divers feed by hand. They do have teeth, but they are tiny and usually don't penetrate our gloves when they accidentally get us. One time one of them thought he had a smelt, but actually had my finger. He mashed down hard and his teeth got into my skin next to my finger nail. The pressure actually smarted quite a bit, but I didn't really feel the cutting. He let up once he realized his mistake, and I finished the feed as usual, only noticing the cut (it wasn't very deep) after I pulled my glove off after the dive.
We call our leopards "the puppies" because feeding them is like kneeling down and feeding a bunch of puppies that jump all over you. The leopards weeve in and out, between our legs, around our mid-section, and sometimes go through the loops in our regulator hoses. One time one of them made a pass at the food bucket, then continued up so that his mouth was right up against my cheek. He sensed my regulator hose and bit, probably thinking it was a fish. Of course, when these guys get ahold of something that gives resistance, their first instinct is to shake it like a terrier. He did, yanking the regulator mouthpiece out of my mouth. I was surprised, but had been warned by other divers at the aquarium that this could happen, so I stayed calm, waited the couple seconds it took for the leopard shark to realize his mistake and let the reg go, and put the reg back in my mouth and continued the feed. It was actually sort of a fun experience in a way. Of course, the aquarium guests watching the feed were slack-jawed.
The zebra sharks in our Tropical Reef exibit aren't fed by hand by the divers. The aquarists feed them from the surface using a long pole. However, we think one of the divers on one of the shifts has started giving them a piece or two during the feed (a big no-no!), because one of the zebras has started coming at our feed bucket trying to get a snack. These sharks are heftier than the leopards: they can get ~7-9 feet and ~150 lbs. Generally, when they come over hoping for a morsel, we just gently but firmly push them away, putting our gloved hands on the top of their heads. Once in a while, though, they will grab the neoprene cover on the top of our feed buckets and shake, ripping it off the bucket. One time a zebra grasped my elbow (we always wear full 5 mm wetsuits) and mouthed it a bit before letting go. She didn't really bite down very hard, so I figure she was just testing to see if she had got a piece of food. Another time a fellow diver on another shift had the same thing happen, only this time the zebra bit down and ripped a decent chunk of neoprene off the wetsuit. The diver was unharmed.
Strange as it may sound, getting mouthed by these sharks in the aquarium has made me even more comfortable around similar sized sharks in the open ocean. I think it's because I get a feeling of "eh, it's not all that bad" when I think about being accidentally bitten. Of course, that doesn't apply to the big fellows, but there you go.
UnderwaterBumbleBee
Contributor
This was a great story! Was relieved to see it was just a hickey and not a chunk!
I just thought people went crazy around full moons (100% Believer).... Now I know to steer clear of the water then too!:mooner:
I just thought people went crazy around full moons (100% Believer).... Now I know to steer clear of the water then too!:mooner:
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