Carcharodon carcharias,
known as the Great White Shark; is one of the most magnificent beasts
to roam the oceans. With a life span of 70+ years* (Donald 2014), and
the ability to eventually grow 6.4 metres in length, or larger
(Encyclopedia of Life n.d.), it's impressive not only for its size, but
also it's speed and agility. Great Whites like most mega-fauna are
functionally warm-blooded due to a phenomenon known as gigantothermy,
their large bulk and smaller relative skin surface area makes it easier
to conserve warmth (Wallace 2009), and like several other of the more
active shark species, known as lamnids, they also maintain a warmer body
temperature because of a very elegant heat transfer system in which
blood which is warmed by the activity of large muscles (and what muscles
they are, these sharks sure can leap), warms the ocean-chilled blood
being pumped in from the gills before it reaches the muscles (Helfman et
al. 1997, 83-86). This conserves warmth for the muscles, and allows
these sharks to be more active, and to range through colder oceans
(Ibid.).
Great White Sharks have adapted as
transoceanic migrators, meaning that they cross oceans to feed and
reproduce. Nicole, a female Great White tagged off South Africa,
travelled between South Africa, Western Australia, and back again,
within a nine month period, and scientists think it's possible that
Great Whites might use celestial cues to navigate, just like human
sailors (WCS 2005).
Great White Sharks rarely display
aggression towards human (despite being entirely wild animals), and deep
sea diver Ocean Ramsey regularly proves this by hitch-hiking her way
through the ocean on the dorsal fin of these giants:
(
Source)
My government, the government of Western Australia, has recently decided to begin culling this already vulnerable species.
This
is a terrible decision, as being an apex predator, the removal of the
Great White Shark will destabilise the ocean's ecosystems. It's also not
a local issue, as being that these sharks are transoceanic migrators (
a fact that is recognised by our federal Department of Wildlife), they
are not local anywhere, but instead belong to the world's oceans.
Australian Navy diver Paul de Gelder (who lost limbs in a shark attack)
has vociferously argued against every element of the proposed cull, ending his argument with:
“The
ocean is not our back yard swimming pool and we shouldn't expect it to
be one. It's a wondrous, beautiful, dangerous place that provides our
planet with all life. It and it's inhabitants need protection from those
that would do it harm.” (de Gelder 2014)
Eight other shark attack survivors are also protesting the cull.
Putting
aside (for a moment) that shark attacks trail nearly every other cause
of death of injury to afflict Western Australians**;
this
attempt to effectively remove sharks which people feel (irrationally)
threatened by would necessitate culling Great White Sharks into
extinction. Hooks will be used to catch sharks (and plenty
of other sea creatures besides that), and all sharks over 3 meters in
length will be slaughtered. Those are the sexually mature specimens
necessary to the species survival – female Great Whites are not sexually
mature until they reach a length of between 4.5 and 5 metres in length
(Encyclopedia of Life n.d.).
Scientists have been quick to point out both how terrible this cull's effects would be
in an open letter by a 102 scientists, and how many other measures could be taken (including tagging sharks to ping alerts when they near populated areas,
a measure that's already being used to track 300 sharks).
Please,
wherever you are in the world, raise awareness of this issue and
protest it. If you're in Australia, head to one of the protest rallies
on February 1st (details here). If you're not able to make it to a rally, write to Premier Colin Barnett to express your discontent and email Western Australia's Environmental Protection Agency at info@epa.wa.gov.au to ask them to reject the shark cull.
*disturbingly,
the measure used to calculate the age of Great White Sharks was their
exposure to nuclear bombs in the '50s and '60s.
**though here are some quick statistics:
Since
1791 when Australian national records began, there have been 217 fatal
sharks attacks, and 675 shark attacks resulting in injury. That's (over
223 years) an average of less than one shark induced fatality a year,
and 3 injuries caused by shark attacks per year (Australian Geographic
2014).
Considering how much time Australians spend in
the ocean (possibly more than any other large nation, given that the
vast majority of our population lives on the coast, and we enjoy
exploring the wonderful collection of shipwrecks along the Western
Australian coast***, as well as our pictureque reefs), that's a pretty
low fatality rate.
The blood-lust fervour to kill these
sharks is incredibly disproportionate, and already locals have begun indiscriminately killing sharks (of various species), ahead of the government endorsed cull (
Source: WARNING, graphic images of mutilated shark and ray carcasses).
(
Source)
No equivalent outrage is being
made about the fact that an average of
70 women are murdered by their male partners in Australia, every year (that's an average of
more than one woman murdered every week)
(Pickering 2014), which I can infer to mean that Premier Colin Barnett
(who is responsible for the cull) finds men who murder women to be
creatures worthy of greater sympathy.
***Western
Australia is called 'The Shipwreck Coast'. I was quite furious to see an
article labelling out coast as “dangerous” because of sharks. I can
only assume the idiot who wrote it wasn't local, because we've had more
than 1650 recorded shipwrecks (Western Australian Museum n.d.) (which
vastly exceed the number of fatal shark attacks
anywhere in Australia, in all of recorded history),
so by any measure, the most dangerous thing in Western Australia's
waters, is our own coast and waters. You can wave at the skeleton of the
Omeo from Fremantle when the tide is low.
References
de Gelder, P. 2014. Kill Em All!!!
http://pauldegelder.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/kill-em-all-firstly-for-anyone-that-has.html (accessed January 21, 2014).
Donald, R. 2014.
Great White Sharks Life Span Proven To Be As Long As Humans.
http://www.utahpeoplespost.com/2014/01/great-white-sharks-life-span-proven-to-be-as-long-as-humans/ (accessed January 22, 2014).
Encyclopedia of Life. n.d.
Carcharodon carcharias Great White Shark.
http://eol.org/pages/213726/details (accessed January 22, 2014).
Helfman, G.S., B.B. Collette, and D.E. Facey. 1997.
The Diversity of Fishes. Blackwell Publishing: Malden, Massachusetts.
Pickering, C. 2014.
Charlie Pickering wants to speak to you about your priorities.
http://www.mamamia.com.au/domestic-violence-2/charlie-pickering-chat-priorities/ (accessed January 21, 2014).
Wallace, B. 2009.
Gigantothermy: Size Matters.
http://deepseanews.com/2009/04/gigantothermy-size-matters/ (accessed January 22, 2014).
Western Australian Museum. n.d.
Shipwreck Databases Western Australian Museum.
http://museum.wa.gov.au/maritime-archaeology-db/wrecks (accessed January 21, 2014).
WCS. 2005.
Great White Shark swims 12,400 miles, shocks scientists.
http://news.mongabay.com/2005/1006-wcs.html (accessed January 21, 2014).
