Answer to a Comment

The anglers are pissed off.

What was a short and noncommittal post mentioning Delray Beach has triggered a surprising response. At the same time, the usually irreproachable and intelligent Sharky has waded in knee-deep and is using the same unfortunate arguments.

Before I post my answer to that comment, here's where I stand on some of the issues raised.

I haven't met Jimmy Abernethy personally and am on record for being unconvinced by some of his apparent procedures (and never having dived with him, I'm also on record for reserving my final judgment on that) and for being disappointed that his signature dive site, Tiger Beach, is not being protected and is being thrashed by other operators.
These ad personam attacks are however totally uncalled for, especially the underhanded reference to the tragic accident of Markus Groh. Jimmy loves Sharks and together with Gary Adkison, he is without a doubt the one person that has single-handedly introduced the most people to Sharks and turned them into Shark lovers in the process. His fans and followers are legion and many of them have embarked on the path of Shark Conservation after having dived with him. This is his legacy - and not the accident, as an equally unfortunate comment has suggested.

Trophy hunting and trophy fishing have no possible justification, ethical or otherwise.
I'm all for hunting and fishing for food, as long as the species are not endangered and as long as the animals are dispatched humanely.
Yes I realize that some believe that the thrill of stalking a prey or of wrestling with a large Fish is "fun" - but this is the 21st century and we must all progress from our troglodyte origins towards being modern and civilized human beings with ethical imperatives. Killing (and also, torturing) animals for the thrill alone will never meet those prerequisites, ever. And I may be repeating myself - real men just don't do that!
This is an example of that kind of behavior - and yes, those were land-based anglers!

I believe that good conservation should be based on consensual and pragmatic solutions.
But not necessarily always. Sometimes, as in Ft. Myers, the anglers need to be shown the "stick" in order to agree to come to the negotiating table. Very rarely, the pro-Shark faction is just being dealt the better hand and if so, they should certainly play it. The good people of Delray Beach have every right to decide about what happens on their beach and if the decision is to ban Shark fishing, I can only applaud it. After all, my thing is Shark conservation, not diplomatic relations and universal peace and justice.

That said, over to my response.
It got longer and longer and finally, Blogger refused to accept it in the comments section - so there.

Thank you for your comment.

I however disagree with your standpoint in so many ways.

a. Catch & release is not a "good thing" - not to fish for Sharks is.
Yes, catch & release is certainly better than killing - but it is cruel and unneccessary nevertheless.

Look, I'm an angler myself and although I don't target them, I sometimes hook a Billfish.
Like any responsible catch & release angler, I will try and get the Fish to the boat in the shortest time possible and with the minimum of stress to the animal.
That involves maneuvering the boat in such a way that the Fish is not being muscled in during a protracted fight, to the point where it may even die of exhaustion. The release is then effected immediately whilst the animal is submerged and often, it involves "walking" the animal in order to aerate its gills until it can then swim away under its own power.

All evidence suggests that often, land-based Shark fishermen do not act that way, especially when they hook big animals.
The Sharks can only be landed once they are completely exhausted. Often, they get dragged onto the beach where considerable time is spent taking measurements and posing for pictures.
This is certainly extremely stressful for the animals and it is only fair to assume that some will not survive that treatment.
This is not cool.



If they want to gain any "credibility", the land-based anglers must be asked to review their procedures when catching and releasing Sharks.

b. Jim Abernethy (with an "e") is uniquely positioned to comment about the dangers of baiting for Sharks ("chumming" is something else - and I sure hope the Shark anglers don't do that!) precisely BECAUSE he operates baited Shark dives and thus knows intimately how the animals behave in those conditions.

Like us here in Fiji, he does it well away from any beaches and surface oriented aquatic recreationists. And like us, he does not allow any snorkelers, swimmers, nor even free divers on those trips.
And for good reason!
Once you bait for Sharks, they behave differently - even smaller piscivorous species like Blacktips and Carribean Reefs. Whereas divers can minimize risks by displaying adequate behavior, people at the surface become particularly vulnerable to the threat of attracting the Sharks' attention and being bitten as a consequence.

To cut to the chase, fishing (for Sharks but also for other Fishes) and surface-oriented beach activities like swimming and body surfing just don't go together.
Would you feel safe to go and have a dip right next to where some anglers deploy bait or drag in struggling Fish? Really? I for sure would not!

I've said it before: the chicken have come home to roost.
Jimmy and other Shark operators have been chased out of Florida by people claiming that his "chumming" (mind you - way offshore) was a public safety hazard - and now some of the very same groups are claiming that doing the precise same thing directly on the beach is unproblematic!
If there's an issue of credibility, it certainly does not reside with Jim.

c. I was not at the meeting (were you?) and don't know if and what pictures were presented, and how.
But one has only to surf the website of the South Florida Shark Club and view the many YouTube clips featuring land based fishing to see that the behavior displayed is sometimes problematic (and I'm being polite).
In that light, it is really of no importance where the pictures presented were taken - it's pretty obvious that there is no common code of conduct and that the allegations of rowdy behavior, littering, Shark kills, daytime fishing and chumming are certainly plausible.
In fact, I just happen to know somebody completely and utterly un-involved in this matter who lives there - and having asked, that person has confirmed some of the above grievances.

To sum it up, dragging in Fish and Sharks from a beach in a residential area is problematic.
There's a reason why hunters go hunting in the wilderness and not in city parks - and this is not much different.

If the land-based anglers want to pursue their activities in Delray Beach, they will have to assuage the reservations of the residents, the more since many of the anglers don't live there. It is for them, not the residents of Delray Beach, to do the convincing, to come up with viable solutions and compromises and to have their members stick to some acceptable code of conduct.
Barring that, they will need to go fishing somewhere else.

79 new Sharks?

Jimmy's Emma - a different species than our Scarface? Great pic by Jim Abernethy.

Not at all!
Trust the journos to parrot the same erroneous information without ever bothering to consult the source! Even the abstract specifies clearly that the analysis comprises approx. 574 Elasmobranchs and that it has identified 38 potentially new species of Sharks and 41 potentially new Rays.
Be it as it may, that's a whole lotta new species - maybe!

The gist?
David has already posted this great review pointing out that if confirmed by further in-depth analysis, the results will have important consequences for conservation, especially for those species that are already classified as threatened with extinction.
Personally, being very much a lumper, I look at these findings with great skepticism - but then again, my taxonomy guru teaches me that the best definition of a species is what a good systematist says it is, so who am I to argue!

But what does that mean for us Shark divers?
Having finally found the time to read through the whole 263 pages, here are the results for some of the most commonly encountered Sharks, in the same order as presented in the paper. It's obviously a subjective selection and readers with a particular interest in other species may find them in the paper that analyzes about half of the species that are currently being recognized.

• Silky, C. falciformis.
  One single species, with Atlantic and Pacific sub-populations.


• Blue, P. glauca.
  One single species, possibly not warranting an independent monotypic genus


• Grey Reef, C. amblyrhynchos.
  Now this is a really interesting one, as the authors are resurrecting the infamous C. wheeleri, or (short-nosed) Blacktail Reef Shark, essentially the Grey Reef from the Red Sea and also the Maldives etc.
  wheeleri can be distinguished by the white upper margin of the first dorsal fin and shorter snout, and by the fact that apparently, it never displays any of the typical agonistic behavior. It was thus once considered to be an own species but then lumped together with was then C. menisorrah (the Grey Reef from the Pacific) into the Indopacific C. amblyrhynchos.
  Here at Shark Reef, we see Grey Reefies with and without white tips and with varying snout lengths, meaning that I continue to remain highly skeptical that these are indeed different species.


• Silvertip, C. albimarginatus.
  One single species with possible sub-populations.


• Galapagos and Dusky, C. galapagensis and obscurus.
  The paper comes to the surprising conclusion that these may well be one and the same species, with the Galapagos merely representing the oceanic form of the Dusky that is confined to continental shelves and adjacent pelagic waters, but with sub-population from the Western North Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico. Very interesting!


• Oceanic Whitetip, C. longimanus.
  One single species although the samples were not sufficiently representative of its distribution.


• Caribbean Reef, C. perezi.
  Very much unsurprisingly, one single species.


• Blacktip, C. limbatus.
  Latest since the discovery of hybrids with C. tilstoni, the Australian Blacktip, this whole group including C. amblyrhynchoides, the Graceful Shark needs to be re-examined. Limbatus appears be at least two species, the Western Atlantic C. limbatus proper and then C. cf. limbatus (possibly C. pleurotaeniae) from the Indo-Pacific and Eastern Atlantic.
  Yes it's complicated!


• Blacktip Reef, C. melanopterus.
  Possibly two species, one being from the Red Sea.


• Bull, C. leucas.
  Possibly three species: C. leucas from the Western Atlantic, C. cf. leucas 1 from Asia and C. cf. leucas 2 from South Africa.
  This really comes as no surprise in view of the possibly record Bull caught in the Breede River, and as we're always hearing that our animals are substantially bigger than those from the Caribbean.
  But this may not even be the whole story: I hear that Mahmood is finally about to publish his own findings that include the specimens we have collected in Fiji, so keep watching this space!


• Sandbar and Bignose, C. plumbeus and altimus.
  Possibly two species, one Indo-Pacific Sandbar C. cf. plumbeus (possibly C. japonicus) and then one Atlantic Sandbar C. plumbeus that however clusters with all specimens of the morphologically totally distinct Bignose!
  Talk about a taxonomic clusterfuck - literally!


• Reef Whitetip, T. obesus.
  One single species.


• Sicklefin Lemon and Lemon, N. acutidens and brevirostris.
  One single species each.


• Scalloped Hammerhead, S. lewini.
  At least two possible species, S. lewini 1 from the Atlantic and Western Indian Ocean and S. lewini 2 from the Pacific, with possibly further cryptic sub-clusters at species level as e.g. reported here.


• Great Hammerhead, S. mokarran.
  Possibly two species, S. mokarran 1 from the Atlantic and S. mokarran 2 from the Indopacific.


• Tiger, G. cuvier.
  Possibly two species, G. cuvier from the Indopacific and G. cf. cuvier (possibly G. arcticus) from the Atlantic.


• Shortfin and Longfin Mako, I. oxyrinchus and paucus.
  One single species each.


• Great White, C, carcharias.
  One single species, however featuring an Atlantic/Indian Ocean and a Pacific sub-population - but then again, read this about the Mediterranean GWs!


• Zebra, S. fasciatum.
  One single species.


• Whale, R. typus.
  Probably one species.


• Nurse, G. cirratum.
  Probably two species, G. cirratum from the Western Atlentic and then G. cf. cirratum (the Pacific Nurse Shark) from Baja as suggested by Castro.

And of the Rays

• Manta, Manta birostris.
  The authors appear unconvinced of Andrea's resurrection of M. alfredi - but for once, having witnessed the obvious difference both in appearance and behavior between the Pelagic and Reef Mantas, I'm totally sold on the fact that there are at least these two species.


• Spotted Eagle Rays, Aetobatus spp
  Will White has revised the Genus and come up with various species, i.e. the original Spotted Eagle Ray A. narinari from the Western Atlantic, the Whitespotted Eagle Ray A. ocellatus from the Indo-West Pacific, the Pacific Whitespotted Eagle Ray A. laticeps for Baja, the Longheaded Eagle Ray A. flagellum from India and Borneo and finally, an undescribed fifth possible species from Vietnam.

Of course, I remain generally unconvinced.
I'm an avid conchologist and have witnessed how the Cowries, once grouped within the genus Cypraea, have been subdivided into ever more genera, species, sub-species and races, this very much to the detriment of my wallet and to the delight of the traders. There it is business and here, I fear, much of it is excessive scrutiny.

Granted, I probably don't know what I'm talking about.
But to me, if two Sharks look and behave very much the same, let alone interbreed and produce fertile "hybrids" like C. tilstoni and C. limbatus, they are one and the same Shark.
But speciation is of course a gradual process, and the boundaries between species can thus be extremely fuzzy. As a consequence, the threshold of what constitutes a "species" will always be the result of convention rather than the "truth" - meaning that I'm both right and wrong! :)

What I find more compelling are the biogeographic aspects.
Apart from the strict endemics and the truly global pelagic species like the Blue, most Sharks are situated between the two and there exist distinct regional populations that may or may not be considered distinct species.
One such notable region is clearly the Atlantic where there are already a few Sharks featuring corresponding sister species in the Indopacific, like the Nurse/Tawny, the Lemon/Sicklefin and the Caribbean/Grey Reef Sharks. Other such regions are the Middle East, South-East Asia and Australia.

Long story short?
Whatever the ultimate definition of whether those local populations are species, sub-species, races or whatever, those distinct genetic pools warrant further investigation. And alas, they also warrant specific local management and conservation measures, meaning that the task at hand has certainly become even more daunting.

But a Tiger remains a Tiger remains a Tiger!

Jimmy - get well soon!

Thank you George for posting the following video.
It really says it all: it was an accident - and if one has thousands of close interactions with predatory Sharks, those things will just happen. Just ask any reputable Shark researcher! :)
Not to worry!

Kudos to Jimmy (Abernethy, with an "e"!) and to WPTV for having managed to turn this into what is essentially very much a pro-Shark story!

So from all of us here in Fiji, here's to Jimmy's full and speedy recovery - Jimmy, may you be back with your beloved animals real soon!

Undercurrent on Sharks

We knew this was coming.

Vanessa Richardson contacted Andrew a while ago asking for his take on the Shark Diving Industry and whether we had changed anything after the Bahamas accident - the answer to that being, No why should we.
The result of her interviews, Death of a Shark Diver, Redux is a free, public article and you can read it right here .

And you should.
I must say that all-in-all, I like it. Not that I would agree with many of the opinions expressed therein - but still, it offers a largely unbiased overview of what is happening within the Industry, and that in itself is a good thing.

I particularly appreciated hearing something from Jimmy Abernethy.
Me, too, I've never witnessed a Shark acting as if divers were potential prey and although I remain skeptical about his procedures, he really is a master of his trade and certainly among the best operators offering cageless macro Shark encounters in the Bahamas - especially after having witnessed the unspeakable mayhem and stupidity perpetrated by other operators and facilitators last year. Yes I know, "somebody" will object to my take, and there's still the open question of why Tiger Beach is not being protected - but that's what I believe and I stick to it.

Burgess being Burgess, I didn't expect much else from him.
I certainly concur when he says that when Shark accidents happen, the culprits are not the animals but the people who attract them - hence the need for the strictest possible protocols if one decides to do so. Shark feeding is controversial and poorly researched and barring the publication of unequivocal data and results (keep watching this space!), everybody is entitled to an opinion - as long as it's not outright ludicrous and the person proffering it has some standing.
Which of course leads me straight to the world's foremost shark expert, and only professional shark-human interaction specialist! Hilarious! This is really the one time where CDNN got it right - on Ritter and incidentally, on Discovery's bite shows as well!
And I'll leave it at that!

As I said, good reading - the links, too!
Enjoy!

Surprise!

Very dapper indeed! :)

Cool!

Photographer and Shark Expert Jim Abernethy thought he was getting some photographs and video of a blue marlin, but he wasn't alone.

Photographed in the Bahamas in May along with Guy Harvey and the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation. For more on sharks and the problems they face, check out the new film, This is Your Ocean: Sharks.

Enjoy! :)

Tiger Shark Movements at Tiger Beach - Paper!

You can visit the iconic Tiger Beach with GSD members Jim Abernethy Scuba Adventures and Epic Diving.

Good one!

Read this.

If I understand it correctly, it appears that the effects of provisioning at Tiger Beach are, if at all, minimal insofar as the Shark diving schedules appear to have an only negligible influence on overall Tiger Shark movements, and as the large majority of individual Sharks did leave for their annual migrations as already described many years ago.

And the four homebodies?

Maybe they just like it there, maybe they're in love with Jimmy or Eli, maybe they're just lazy or maybe that's just the "right" amount of Tigers in that area, who knows - plus, as our own research has shown, residency may be completely different in another year!

Long story short?

This is once again evidence that Shark tourism in general and Shark provisioning in  particular appear unproblematic at the ecosystem level whereas at finer scales, effects are, if at all, clearly sub-lethal. Granted it's merely a data point - but the evidence is certainly mounting!

And our increasingly irritating detractors? Like I never cease to repeat, come up with some fucking evidence or shut the fuck up! 

But I'm digressing as usual.

Enjoy Neil et al's interesting paper!

 

This is your Ocean: Sharks!

Is this Emma? Fantastic pic by Jim Abernethy!

Great trailer!

Like the last time, no comments.
If you're interested to know more, go and explore the website and George's blog - it is obviously connected to this.

Enjoy!

This is Your Ocean: Sharks - Official Trailer from George Schellenger on Vimeo.

Bravo Jimmy!

Well said!

I've said it before, Mark's iDiveSharks is the place to be!
This week features a post by none other than Mr. Tiger Beach himself, Jimmy Abernethy. We've never met and to be perfectly frank, our relationship can probably be safely described as being wary ever since some weasel managed to start a small skirmish by proxy involving one of our best common friends, of which we have many.

I also won't deny that having reached completely different conclusions and until convinced otherwise, I remain skeptical about having large predatory Sharks circulate freely among tourists during commercial baited Shark dives.
But that's just my opinion as as such, certainly debatable - as incidentally is our controversial hand feeding!

What I'm however adamantly opposed to, are the ever increasing shenanigans happening on that site, of which this one is but a particularly stupid example - and I spare you the other links.

Not that he probably cares, but kudos to Jimmy for having spoken up and said it as it is - couldn't agree more! Let's hope that somebody listens! As a minimum, his countless fans!
I cite.

Once again the real threat with all these very large sharks was that many of the guests fell in love with our girl, Emma!
She seems harmless just like a big dog, but that doesn't mean she might accidentally hurt someone, while checking out their cameras etc, especially if someone did something stupid!

Yes, hugging and kissing in my opinion is stupid!
We are all in titled to our own opinion, but for me anything that puts the shark at a risk of making a mistake while interacting with us isn't worth the risk. Lately it seems many people want to ride or hand feed these beautiful creatures, which I will never allow on my boat.

To me if you truly love them you should treat them with respect.
If an accident happened, many people would like to project it as a shark attack, which isn't right.

I wish everyone that really loves sharks that has actually spent time with them, would work on telling the truth about them, so we can help convince the rest of the world how valuable they are, and why we need them!
The time of monster shark shows and tabloid journalism are outdated with those of us that really know sharks, because we know to much! I don't read the tabloids at the grocery counter and I refuse to work or watch any tabloid monster shows. I prefer the higher road, where these magnificent powerful creatures are projected truthfully!

Sorry probably had to much coffee this morning!
I hope you all are getting your shark fix somewhere soon!
Save the Sharks! Jim

Quo Vadis, Shark Diving?

Check out this video



Yeah, right... what to say...
Even toothy Patric over there at Shark Diver has been unusually restrained in his comments.
Guess we're are all kinda speechless.

Maybe the way to start this thing is to say that one probably shouldn't blame the clients.
Fortunately for all of us, Diving has gone mainstream - but that implies that we really get to see all sorts. The fools we encounter have no particularly nefarious intentions, they are probably just a reflection of what's out there in the general population, and I'm gonna refrain from commenting about the peculiarities of this or that Country - tho being your average xenophobic and campanilistic European, I certainly could!

This may surprise you but I don't even take issue with the tug-of-war with the Lemons.
The Sharks very likely couldn't care less and their reward should amply compensate them for any perceived discomfort. Predation ain't a pretty and peaceful thing and most meals down there come at a cost, energetically and otherwise - just picture those Tigers and Great Hammers that are studded with Stingray barbs and you may agree that Evolution has most likely selected for a fair degree of resilience in Predators.
Not to worry.

Thing is, Shark Diving has certainly come a long, long way!
Mind you, places like Cocos and the Galapagos are still very much the way they used to be - that is, minus the profusion of Sharks, but that's another story altogether. But there, one obviously doesn't need to bait.

Baiting for Sharks was started by professional UW photographers and cinematographers like Cousteau, the Taylors or Herwarth Voigtmann, a German guy who convinced his girlfriend Vreni and then his daughter Bine to pose topless whilst hand- and mouth-feeding Grey Reefies in the Maldives. The images were spectacular and inspired a whole generation of divers.
In the beginning, those were purely private and professional undertakings and kept strictly separated from recreational diving.

The first "proper" commercial Reef Shark feeding operation were probably Stella Maris and UNEXSO in the Bahamas (or maybe it was Herwarth when he decided to go commercial), and Rodney Fox most probably established the first commercial cage diving operation.
But I'm digressing.

Anyway, back then, the Reefies were a real big thing.
With everybody toting along some camera, the clients wanted to emulate the published work of the pros and were willing to pay any price to get face-to-face with a Shark. Shark dives were thus highly lucrative, prompting every Dick Tom and Harry to venture into the business of commercial Shark feeding.
It all was sort of ragtag and improvised (read it, very funny!) and resulted in the establishment of feeding stations like the "Lion's Head" in the Maldives or Avatoru in Rangiroa that were being "worked on" by every Dive Shop in the vicinity. Other feeding stations like those on the Burma Banks or "Valerie's Reef" in PNG were established by Liveaboards and equally shared.
Did anybody care to try and have those areas protected? Of course not - but mind you, those were the 70ies and the 80ies and there was no realization that matters were dire, nor was there the Internet on which to find that information.
Anyway, inexperience being inexperience, competition being competition and Reefies being Reefies, it was only a matter of time til the accidents started piling up.
Sound familiar?

Fortunately, those incidents were only "minor" ones and confined to the feeders who would then be able to proudly, and heroically display the nicks to the ever-present adoring bimbettes.
But they were perceived to be bad for Tourism and the Authorities stepped in and enacted feeding bans. Or, as the sites were not being protected, the bad guys stepped in and fished them out. Fact is, most of those "shared" places have been decommissioned.
The Bahamian and Ozzie operations, on the other hand, quickly saw the writing on the wall and resorted to chainmail suits when hand feeding or to other techniques like Chumsicles and have continued to operate basically unchanged until present times.

Again, I'm just talking about small Reef Sharks - and still, in my recollection, all those commercial dives were strictly structured as spectator events whereby no direct interaction was ever allowed between Sharks and Customers. Consequently, no Customer was ever hurt.
See where this is leading...?

Today, it seems to be an established fact that recreational diving with predatory Sharks in unbaited conditions is possible and safe provided that one respects some basic safety procedures, as in not to interfere with natural predatory events, to be aware of their corporeal language and not to dive in murky water.
Does that extend to macro Predators? Probably the answer is yes, although not having any personal experience with Great Whites, Makos and Oceanic Whitetips, I'm just relaying the opinion of other people in the know whom I trust. Not really being terribly brave myself, I'll however probably give it a pass, especially when it comes to Great Whites.
Thing is, without bait, chances to see any of them are close to zilch anyway.

Owing to Rodney's original insights (and common sense), baited commercial macro (predatory) Shark encounters have so far remained strictly confined to cage diving in oceanic conditions and involve blue water species like Great Whites, Makos and Blues.
The Pros have obviously continued to do what Pros do, and that is, to push the envelope. We all have seen those images. So have the camera-toting clients and I fear that it's only a matter of time until somebody will perceive a competitive edge in taking them cageless.

When it comes to the hitherto more obscure macro Reef Sharks as in Tigers, Bulls and Great Hammerheads, maybe even Lemons, the Jury is still very much out. Until quite recently, there weren't any "established" diving sites for those species and nobody really seemed to have any strong opinions about them, either. That is obviously changing.
The actual consensus seems to be that diving with them, even it baited conditions, doesn't necessarily require any cages.
We at BAD certainly concur with that view.

We will also always defend the right of anybody to interact with predatory Sharks in baited conditions - but only as long as that is being done in private.
Then, it is the same as any other dangerous private undertaking. Having done it myself, I know it to be exciting and highly rewarding and I wish those guys the best of luck and loads of fun. Let's not forget that much of what we consider to be perfectly mainstream today has been pioneered by individualistic adventurers who had the vision, curiosity, recklessness and above all, the balls to give it a try.

However!

When it is being done commercially, we strongly believe that any Operator conducting baited Shark Dives must ensure that the Sharks and the Customers are always kept strictly separated.
This may require using Shark cages or it may require other protocols aimed at obtaining the same result. As I shall never tire to repeat, procedures will always be situation-specific and will always imply a judgment call by the operator. That judgment, we believe, should however never extend to allowing interactive Shark Dives by Customers. Certainly not in Fiji but probably nowhere else, either.




Baited Shark Diving is not recreational SCUBA Diving - never was and never will be. Whereas on Reef Dives, certified divers are routinely left to fend for themselves, we believe that on baited Shark Dives, the onus of supervising the Clients and ensuring their safety rests squarely with the Operators.

We also believe this, although it doesn't directly concern this tread.
Exploiting a dive site automatically entails a personal obligation for its Stewardship. This is especially true for Shark Diving and I invite everybody to refrain from diving with Operators who do not make a contribution to Shark Conservation in general and who do not aim at protecting their sites in particular. We've made that mistake 40 years ago and we must learn from that experience.

Having been one of them, I'm certainly acutely aware of the aspirations of the many gifted and experienced hobby photographers and cinematographers.
They tend to be the wealthiest, best traveled, most experienced and also, the most influential of our Clients and we love to showcase their work as part of our marketing, the more as they often match and sometimes surpass the results of the Pros. After all, once one has mastered the technique, much is due to pure luck and perseverance which are not linked to somebody's professional qualifications.
Whenever possible, at BAD, we try to position them in such a way that they will "get the shot" , which they mostly do - but that's where the buck stops.
Whatever their level of experience and regardless of their sometimes vociferous reservations, our Customers are never allowed to go fully interactive or to go exploring by themselves.

We reserve that right for bona fide Industry Professionals, and even then, never without close supervision. It's obviously an arbitrary and imperfect differentiation - but that's where we have chosen to draw the line and that's that.
Despite of the obvious dilemma of having to choose between business and principle, we remain of the opinion that this is the only sustainable way for us to operate in this Industry.

I just corresponded with another Industry Professional about this and got back this comment.

"There always exists risks of an accident or the unexpected taking place and as the organizers and "folks in charge", we have a moral (as well as probably legal obligation) to ensure that people are not hurt on one of our adventures, through actions we encourage. We have discussed and continue to discuss ways to reduce that possibility, but we need to do that without taking away the major reason of why people are there and what we are trying to offer them. I entirely agree that we must all tread very carefully, for the sake of our clients health, but perhaps even more so for the sake of the sharks."

I could not agree more - that's precisely the Catch-22 we're facing.

We will always be asked by our Customers to make exceptions and to push the envelope just a tiny little bit more. That's what Customers will never cease to do in their quest for ever more adrenaline and ever more spectacular images.
The privilege, and obligation to make those decisions is however not theirs, but ours. It is us, the commercial Operators, who need to define the limits of where this can be allowed to go - for the safety of our Clients but for our own safety, too, and for the sake of the survival of our Industry. I believe that when it comes to Commercial Shark Diving, we have reached the very limit of what is possible whilst still being reasonable. One more small step in the wrong direction and it's gonna bite us all in the ass.
I just wish that everybody in the Industry could agree on this.
(Yeah I know I know, and Pigs will fly...)

Let's be honest about this - and this is directed to you, our valued Customers as we the Operators know it already. 
 Don't get me wrong, predatory Sharks are not Man-Hunters - but they're certainly never, ever harmless, either!
In fact, predatory macro Sharks are bloody dangerous and anybody claiming otherwise doesn't know what he's talking about! It is great to be pro-Shark and anti-"Jaws"- it is however utter foolishness to believe that your Love is being reciprocated.
It is not!

Although I concur with those who say that interacting with the nervous and frisky Reefies is more challenging than interacting with the Big Boys, it is equally true that the resulting accidents are relatively harmless.
Having witnessed quite a few bites, I know that piscivorous Reef Sharks couldn't care less about human blood and will leave it at that. I also know that the bites, albeit painful, are easily fixed with a couple of stitches and some antibiotics - in fact, dog bites are probably worse. Barring a tragedy as the severing of a major artery, the victims are certainly going to survive.

Macro predatory Sharks may seem manageable and in the case of Tigers with their placid cruising speed and dreamy eyes, they may even appear to be outright mellow. It is also quite safe to assume that they equally have no interest in attacking SCUBA Divers.
But let there never be a doubt about how immensely powerful they are, and how potentially lethal! Their bites are always devastating and once blood has been spilled, there's no reason to assume that they will never jump at the chance for a meal, the more as many of them are generalistic feeders whose diet includes mammals.

Please, let's not be stupid!

Accidents have happened and will continue to happen - that's the nature of what we do and we're also certainly not infallible.
I would also presume that each and everyone of us is striving to conduct things as safely and professionally as possible. After all, we would all like to conduct good, sustainable business. Also, none of us has a Death Wish - right?

Thus, and contrary to maybe others, I'm quite willing to accept that there will be freak accidents and bona fide mistakes.
Where I personally draw the line is where those events are clearly the result of negligence and hubris. Yes this will always remain a learning experience - but the learning curve needs to be bloody steep! This is now a global Industry and we should profit from it, by always being eager to keep abreast of what's going on in other parts of the world. That includes taking on other people's insights and being willing to learn from mistakes, our own and those of others, too.
By the same token, we should always keep in mind that what we do affects everybody else in the Industry, and vice versa.
 
That's why I am so shocked by this video.
It is obviously preposterous and embarrassing and depicts a bunch of stupid, reckless and disrespectful morons - but that is not the issue. As I said, they sure come in all shapes and guises and it is up to us to deal with that. I sure hope they've left a huge tip!

The issue here is the apparent utter failure by the Operator to provide those guys with any guidance, it is his obvious disregard for safety procedures and it is also his failure to recognize the damage a video like this will inflict to his reputation, and to that of the Industry as a whole.

Quite frankly, I still keep scratching my head.
What possessed him to let this happen on his watch? Is he just being oblivious of the dangers? Or, is he maybe trying to occupy a competitive niche by attracting the mavericks?
Perhaps he just doesn't give a shit - but whatever his motivation, or lack of: This is just not sustainable.

It is also profoundly disrespectful.
Turning this site into a circus arena makes a mockery of those people, foremost of which Jimmy Abernethy, who cautiously nurtured Tiger Beach into being one of the best, safest and most prominent Shark Diving destinations in the world and committed so much to educate divers and to protect and justify Shark Diving's existence.
A good friend just wrote

"Funny, last night at dinner a colleague and I were discussing the absurd video and how insulted I felt after viewing it. I had a range of emotions of embarrassment, disappointment, anger and sheer disbelief and a bit of shame that this is what we have come to in what we all had so passionately protected and cultivated over the years."

This is not about Ethics, or the like.
This is about the professional standards and the future of the Shark Diving Industry and quite frankly, it's all rather disheartening.

Let's hope somebody learns something from it - tho alas, I'm not about to start holding my breath.