Sharks: Not as bad as you think

Sharks are scary creatures, this i will not dispute, especially as i saw one take a small bite out of someone’s arm once when i was surfing!

However what i do dispute is the need to kill them all! This entirely unneccesary thing happens for a number of reasons.

Shark fins - highly prized for food, medicine etc. As of recently Holland and Barratt still carried herbal remedies which contained cartillage from shark fins, fished from an unsustainable, and some have said possibly illegal source. Of course i wouldn’t say that though. I appreciate that some island communities can use this practice as a sustainable means of income, but large scale culling is creating a huge problem for ocean biodiversity.

Secondly, sharks are killed because they interfere with our lives. Did you know that in South Africa, sharks are lured away from popular tourist beaches by towing bait to more remote locations? Once the sharks reach the bait they are caught and killed. Of course this becomes a vicious cycle, as more and more sharks are attracted to the area.

Yes, some sharks can kill humans, but only when they mistake you for a nice seal or some such. There may still be undiscovered species of sharks swimming around down there, due to a real lack of research.

Cute and cuddly species such as dolphins and sea turtles get all the good press, and therefore all the good funding. If you were a jobbing marine biologist looking for some work, would you pitch an idea that was more likely to get long term funding, or an idea that had very little chance? Exactly.

I’m not suggesting that you go and hug a shark, but i would like you to see them for the amazing role they play in regulating ocean ecosystems. Remember, they also keep nastier creatures than themselves at bay.

If all the sharks in the world disappear, we could be in a whole lot of trouble!

Hmmm

So i met Miliband the other day, got all excited about his views on protecting our coastal environment, and now Brown has made him the bloody foreign secretary! Gah!

Exciting things afoot…

I will be attending a coastal climate change conference on Friday.

The environment minister will be there, as well as scientists from the IPCC and other important people.

Watch this space for a full report!

In other news, i am now fully qualified to talk about these things!

I don’t really want my kettle boiled by radioactivity, thankyou muchly

Despite having my head buried in a book about Integrated Coastal Zone Management (why did i pick that module? It sounded ‘exotic’), it has come to my attention that the government has published their latest Energy White Paper. I had just enough time between revision breaks to get a little bit peeved. (only a little, because i’d wasted a lot of time deciding between a penguin bar or a hobnob. Tough call)

I can understand why the government is concerned about security of supply, as i believe not many people abroad like us at the moment. Oh yes, i know about these things because i watched Eurovision.

I just don’t think nuclear power is a good idea. First of all, Wales and Scotland would not allow any more to be built in their regions, so all the stations would be in the South of England. Bearing in mind the long term nature of radioactivity, i don’t think placing these sites in an area that would be first to go underwater with global sea level change is particularly bright. But hey, that’s just me.

Secondly, whilst renewables are generally a GOOD THING, they have to be the right sort to provide a net benefit. A barrage across the Severn would not, in my opinion be a net benefit. Placing such a massive piece of hard engineering in such a unique environment is not good, especially when tidal turbines (a bit like upside-down wind turbines) could produce a huge amount of power and not dramatically change the landscape.

The barrage scheme makes me think of those unsuccessful sea-defence systems on the East coast. The government has now realised that it is better to work with nature, not against it, and let the marshes grow back. I think a huge barrage scheme, whilst harnessing ‘clean’ energy, would be working against nature, and it is a battle the barrage would eventually lose.

Dolphin-friendly tuna - actually quite silly

Dolphins are lovely, everybody knows that!

And that is exactly why they recieve greater protection over many other marine species. A good example of this is dolphin-friendly tuna. Now i’m sure you are all familiar with the little labels on the side of tuna tins, letting you know that that tin of tuna is dolphin - friendly. I’d just like to highlight a few things to make you a bit more aware of exactly what happens to bring that tin into your shopping basket.

So how did dolphin-friendly tuna come about? Basically fishermen noticed that large shoals of tuna liked to swim under pods of dolphins, and realised they could make a lot of money if they looked for dolphins and then stuck a massive purse seine net in the sea to catch the tuna. Unfortunately this led to a big decline in dolphin numbers, which was followed by that old chestnut, PUBLIC OUTRAGE. So fishermen then had to find tuna at other places, such as on coral reefs etc, and not go looking for them under dolphins. They also had to improve their nets, so that dolphins (who are a little more intelligent than some sea dwellers) could escape through a specially designed system in the top of the net.

There are all sorts of problems with this.

Firstly, dolphin-friendly does not mean that no dolphins were killed during the production of that tin of tuna, but that the fleet that caught the tuna may not have specifically fished where tuna was swimming under a dolphin pod. (I say may not, because it isn’t always regulated.)

Secondly, by fishing for tuna in a much more haphazard way (at a coral reef), where the tuna are mixing with many other species, means that instead of one species being caught as by-catch (i.e dolphins under the old method), hundreds of different species can be caught. Some of these species - such as sea turtles and sharks - are listed as endangered under CITES, and have really slow reproductive rates. Therefore their population drops dramatically. Interestingly, dolphins have a proportionally high reproductive rate, and can recover from a loss in numbers much quicker.

Thirdly, (to simplify), the public love dolphins, and therefore they get a lot of research done on them. The public do not love sharks, and therefore research into the affect of dolphin-friendly tuna on some species is not being undertaken. Even species that are not cute and cuddly are absolutely vital to marine ecosystems, and as many have lower reproductive rates than dolphins, are more likely to die out as a result of dolphin-friendly tuna than the likelyhood of dolphins dying out if we return to old tuna fishing methods.

Environmental groups are at present divided on the merits of dolphin-friendly tuna, but it must be remembered that a lot of these groups supported the idea initially, and their campaigning is part of the reason why we have dolphin-friendly tuna in the first place.

I may actually write this as an article at some point, if i run out of contributors!