LOL Funny stuff there Jim!
Carolyn:shark2:
Carolyn:shark2:
This is why cage diving with sharks is bad!
- Thread starter mocrumbo
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Along with the other incongruities in the OP, we have this:
If scientists are living on the island to study sharks, the island is by definition “inhabitable”, regardless of the difficulty that this existence might entail.
I admit that I have not read the book yet (though it does sound like an interesting and fun read). The reviews that I am seeing relate more to the islands and the history behind them than they do to the practice of using shark cages and/or chumming. The review below discusses the author’s growing obsession with sharks, but does not mention anything about how cage diving is dangerous or a poor practice ecologically speaking. And anyway, the book apparently reads like a novel in the guise of non-fiction, replete with a ghost story and skull cracking beasts.
http://www.bookreporter.com/reviews2/080507581X.asp
Maybe Mocrumbo got spooked by the ghost story in the book and then projected his fear into cage diving in general.
Cheers!
If scientists are living on the island to study sharks, the island is by definition “inhabitable”, regardless of the difficulty that this existence might entail.
I admit that I have not read the book yet (though it does sound like an interesting and fun read). The reviews that I am seeing relate more to the islands and the history behind them than they do to the practice of using shark cages and/or chumming. The review below discusses the author’s growing obsession with sharks, but does not mention anything about how cage diving is dangerous or a poor practice ecologically speaking. And anyway, the book apparently reads like a novel in the guise of non-fiction, replete with a ghost story and skull cracking beasts.
http://www.bookreporter.com/reviews2/080507581X.asp
Maybe Mocrumbo got spooked by the ghost story in the book and then projected his fear into cage diving in general.
Cheers!
widget
Contributor
Its an interesting discussion.
Here there is a lot of controversy about chumming and then allowing divers into the water (in a cage) because the fishermen, lobstermen and abalone divers who make a living in the areas where divers are chumming for great whites say this chumming is altering the natural feeding pattern of these sharks and they are becoming aggressive.
The diveing operations who chum are saying they only use natural foodstuffs from the local area, only chum sufficiently to attract the sharks to the local vicinity of the boat and cage, then stop and that the sharks natural feeding pattern is not altered as the quantity of foodstuffs is minimal, they also show a few shots of divers touching placid sharks to underline the statement.
So, recently a TV channel did a study in conjunction with a marine scientist and various other knowledgable folk to see if the sharks were getting used to the "free food" and becoming more aggressive.
The eventual decision was that "Sharks like most marine animals are opportunistic feeders, if food is available, they will hang around, as soon as the food source dries up, they will move on, they found no proof the sharks were getting more aggressive or hanging around longer than usual".
Personally, I have dived a number of times with the great whites, sometimes in a cage, sometimes not, I have never felt threatened in any way, in my humble opinon most of these stories are just for "shock value".
Here there is a lot of controversy about chumming and then allowing divers into the water (in a cage) because the fishermen, lobstermen and abalone divers who make a living in the areas where divers are chumming for great whites say this chumming is altering the natural feeding pattern of these sharks and they are becoming aggressive.
The diveing operations who chum are saying they only use natural foodstuffs from the local area, only chum sufficiently to attract the sharks to the local vicinity of the boat and cage, then stop and that the sharks natural feeding pattern is not altered as the quantity of foodstuffs is minimal, they also show a few shots of divers touching placid sharks to underline the statement.
So, recently a TV channel did a study in conjunction with a marine scientist and various other knowledgable folk to see if the sharks were getting used to the "free food" and becoming more aggressive.
The eventual decision was that "Sharks like most marine animals are opportunistic feeders, if food is available, they will hang around, as soon as the food source dries up, they will move on, they found no proof the sharks were getting more aggressive or hanging around longer than usual".
Personally, I have dived a number of times with the great whites, sometimes in a cage, sometimes not, I have never felt threatened in any way, in my humble opinon most of these stories are just for "shock value".
Thanks for all of your posts! I have to say that I have absolutely no vested interest in selling books, I already have a very good job. The book "Devil's Teeth" gives the reader an entirely different perspective on these magnificent animals, and how cage diving (in particular, chumming) screws up a lot of things. As for the non-cage dives, it is a matter of common sense and classic conditioning. Chum the water, then throw in divers. Hmmm... divers = food! It is amazing that more accidents don't happen. But I wonder how many near-misses there are that do not get reported?
It's funny, I dive all the time, and non-dives often ask if I am afraid of sharks. Or, what is the scariest thing I have ever seen under the water? The answer is, another diver!
See you at the clean-up, Dr. Bill.
Island Ecology
heather
It's funny, I dive all the time, and non-dives often ask if I am afraid of sharks. Or, what is the scariest thing I have ever seen under the water? The answer is, another diver!
See you at the clean-up, Dr. Bill.
Island Ecology
heather
Bill Fisher
Contributor
This is a copy of a post I wrote from 2005 when this book came out...I hold the same opinion now.
___________________________________________________________________
Great book, and great history of the Farrallons...
I hope one of these guys (the researchers) was bangin' Ms. Casey, because how else could they have made such a goofball decision to let her sit on the anchored boat in the bay????? Her admiration for Mr. Pyle oozes throughout this book, it's almost nauseating.
It's senseless...in my mind she was put at risk, and almost lost at sea!
They hatched this plan after they had been told to suspend shark watch.
Than the boat got lost at sea...what if she had been on it?
It seems to me that the researchers had an awesome thing going, but couldn't live with the fact that other people would like to experience a great white shark encounter too. I guess when you have had the island to yourself during shark season for 10 or more years it would kind of seem like your own.
Casey's opinion of the "cage divers" is more than likely shaped by the opinions of the researchers, not from her own experiences.
After all, she was just doing what the rest of us would like to do, see a great white at the Farrallons!
I personally have seen footage of the researchers ramming into a great white while it was feeding at the surface....seems to be pretty intrusive to me. How is it a "natural" observation when you quickly motor out to the feeding site and accidently plow into the shark?
In my opinion, Mr. Pyle looked like the fool, quite unfortunately...he lost his job at the Farrallons over all this. I think the author was so starstruck by the researcher that even she didn't realize how exploited he looked when the book was over...it ruined his reputation.
Cage divers are still at the Farrallons, the reasearchers are not...too bad they couldn't have worked together like the "cage divers" originally tried to do.
To bad this all went to hell,
No one else in the world had such a long on-going study into the life of Great White sharks...too bad it got ruined, and not by the "cage divers", but by the researchers. It's a shame.
___________________________________________________________________
Great book, and great history of the Farrallons...
I hope one of these guys (the researchers) was bangin' Ms. Casey, because how else could they have made such a goofball decision to let her sit on the anchored boat in the bay????? Her admiration for Mr. Pyle oozes throughout this book, it's almost nauseating.
It's senseless...in my mind she was put at risk, and almost lost at sea!
They hatched this plan after they had been told to suspend shark watch.
Than the boat got lost at sea...what if she had been on it?
It seems to me that the researchers had an awesome thing going, but couldn't live with the fact that other people would like to experience a great white shark encounter too. I guess when you have had the island to yourself during shark season for 10 or more years it would kind of seem like your own.
Casey's opinion of the "cage divers" is more than likely shaped by the opinions of the researchers, not from her own experiences.
After all, she was just doing what the rest of us would like to do, see a great white at the Farrallons!
I personally have seen footage of the researchers ramming into a great white while it was feeding at the surface....seems to be pretty intrusive to me. How is it a "natural" observation when you quickly motor out to the feeding site and accidently plow into the shark?
In my opinion, Mr. Pyle looked like the fool, quite unfortunately...he lost his job at the Farrallons over all this. I think the author was so starstruck by the researcher that even she didn't realize how exploited he looked when the book was over...it ruined his reputation.
Cage divers are still at the Farrallons, the reasearchers are not...too bad they couldn't have worked together like the "cage divers" originally tried to do.
To bad this all went to hell,
No one else in the world had such a long on-going study into the life of Great White sharks...too bad it got ruined, and not by the "cage divers", but by the researchers. It's a shame.
John_B
Grasshopper
Its just the angle, but at first it looks as though the freediver behind the shark only has one leg. :blinking: 
Seriously though, that Shark Diver trip sounds like a great experience. I've added to my "must dive" list (OTOH, its a long list!)...
John
Here are some of my pics from the trip! I will be going back in Oct 09!
Seriously though, that Shark Diver trip sounds like a great experience. I've added to my "must dive" list (OTOH, its a long list!)...
John
Missdirected
Contributor
Here are some of my pics from the trip! I will be going back in Oct 09!
Carolyn:shark2:
Excellent pictures Carolyn! Thanks for posting at least the thread was worth something.
EagleDiver
Registered
I've been cage diving with Great Whites at Isla de Guadalupe in Mexico and loved every minute of it. (My Avatar is a pic I took of a male GW about 15-16' that hung around for all three days of 'diving'.)
After my trip I picked up a copy of 'Devil's Teeth', only to find out the chief 'villain' in that book was the same man who ran the charter I was on at Guadalupe.
In my experience, he was a somewhat off-putting character, but ran a well-organized and safe trip. Safe for the divers and safe for the sharks. He and his crew took great pains to allow the sharks to get as little of the bait tuna as possible (sometimes the sharks were just too fast or too clever). At no point was bait tied close to the boat or cages. That was avoided specifically to prevent the sharks from injuring themselves. Chumming was minimal, seldom done, and in fact wasn't really needed - Sharks were there almost from the moment we anchored.
Since GW populations have been so badly decimated, the chances of seeing one of these magnificent animals on a normal dive is vanishingly small. About the only way to see one (safely) is on a cage dive at locations where, for reasons known and unknown, they gather in large numbers.
As long as it's done with the kind of care I witnessed, and it's done at a remote location like Guadalupe, where recreational diving had already been stopped by the seasonal presence of sharks, I don't see the harm.
And I can see many potential positives. The scientists in 'The Devil's Teeth' took an adversarial approach to the cage-diving operators (although I believe this has changed somewhat since). But it doesn't have to be that way. Cage dive trips like the one I took produce huge volumes of photographs and video of many individual sharks. An organized cooperation between the charters and scientists could do much to aid shark identification, population census, and tracking.
After my trip I picked up a copy of 'Devil's Teeth', only to find out the chief 'villain' in that book was the same man who ran the charter I was on at Guadalupe.
In my experience, he was a somewhat off-putting character, but ran a well-organized and safe trip. Safe for the divers and safe for the sharks. He and his crew took great pains to allow the sharks to get as little of the bait tuna as possible (sometimes the sharks were just too fast or too clever). At no point was bait tied close to the boat or cages. That was avoided specifically to prevent the sharks from injuring themselves. Chumming was minimal, seldom done, and in fact wasn't really needed - Sharks were there almost from the moment we anchored.
Since GW populations have been so badly decimated, the chances of seeing one of these magnificent animals on a normal dive is vanishingly small. About the only way to see one (safely) is on a cage dive at locations where, for reasons known and unknown, they gather in large numbers.
As long as it's done with the kind of care I witnessed, and it's done at a remote location like Guadalupe, where recreational diving had already been stopped by the seasonal presence of sharks, I don't see the harm.
And I can see many potential positives. The scientists in 'The Devil's Teeth' took an adversarial approach to the cage-diving operators (although I believe this has changed somewhat since). But it doesn't have to be that way. Cage dive trips like the one I took produce huge volumes of photographs and video of many individual sharks. An organized cooperation between the charters and scientists could do much to aid shark identification, population census, and tracking.
spoolin01
Contributor
I can see how chumming would agitate the sharks, making a bite more likely. They don't chum for whites at the Farallones from what I've been told, it's illegal here. A couple weeks ago I went to a talk by a long time Farallones commercial diver who now takes amazing video of the sharks. If I heard him correctly, the sharks were more aggressive when divers were less common there. He thinks they've learned that divers don't represent food so they're less curious. It was fun to hear him talk about winning stare-downs with 2000 lb killers, the big sissies...
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