Are we ready for more Sharks?

Source.

Good question!

Read this.

It pretty much completely summarizes this timely little scientific article, so no need to write synopses etc. In brief, those Shark conservation successes may turn out to be be fleeting - especially in those highly populated and/or highly tourism-dependent areas where Shark-human conflicts may increase as a consequence, see e.g. the situation in Cape Cod where IMO we're already only a few Shark bites away from the next Shark/Seal cull.

The authors write,

While widespread success in recovering elasmobranch populations is some time away, scientists, advocates and managers need to be prepared for societal conflicts that may arise when and where it does occur. In particular, implications for current and future conservation management need to be considered as part of conservation strategies in the context of how humans will interact and potentially compete with recovering species.

This will require, from the outset, increased public education and outreach regarding the potential future implications of conservation success and strategies to reduce conflict in order to avoid negative responses to successful conservation outcomes or the thwarting of future conservation endeavours.

That is certainly correct. 

But education and outreach can only go so far, and methinks that akin to what is happening in the highly intractable and complex issue of terrestrial human-wildlife coexistence and human-wildlife conflict mitigation, all will have to be highly species-, location- and context-specific.
And in some cases = where and when other less invasive approaches fail, we may well have to accept that some individual animals may have to be sacrificed so that their populations can continue to survive - see the paper's example of the Galapagos Sharks vs the Hawaiian Monk Seals that is highly reminiscent of Eric's Shark profiling proposal.

As always we shall see shall we not.

And anyway, I say, wouldn't that be a nice problem to have = so first and foremost, let's please make sure that Shark populations recover!

But back to more pleasant matters. 

Let's go Shark diving - sustainably!

PS - Michael Domeier here.
Like him I abhor the illegal out-of-cage diving with GWS and especially, the Shark riding and molesting. But unlike him I really do not believe that any resulting bites would have any implications whatsoever on Shark conservation - rather, nowadays the victim would be rightly berated for having been a fool and the news cycle would quickly move on.

 

Reef Shark Science - the Compendium!

One of our protected Blacktip Reefies. Great pic by Allen!

Wow.

This is just simply brilliant.

Quite the erudite tour de force, and penned by some of the very best minds in the field, it recapitulates the current scientific insights about Reef Sharks, and  charts the way for future research.

No need for synopses as it is thankfully open source.

Just this: among a plethora of valuable information, it also addresses the topic of Reef Shark - mediated trophic cascades along with those infamous postulated inverted pyramids where I also discover this equally unequivocal statement in the cited literature. 

Long story short: both are nothing but breathy myths that need to be binned once-and-for-all! And yes, it's all very much q.e.d (!!!) - and no, I'm not going to repeat myself; instead, please do re-read the part about using spurious garbage when advocating conservation right here!

But I'm obviously digressing as always.

What I really wanted to say is that this is a great paper- and big kudos to the authors!

Required reading - enjoy!

Sharks are not Apex Predators - Paper!

Big Fiji Bull Sharks - definitely Apex! Click for detail!

Hallelujah!

This has one of my pet peeves for a very long time indeed.

And now a panel of illustrious researchers are confirming that the vast majority of Sharks are not apex predators but instead, best described as mesopredators, to wit

We might talk of apex size classes rather than apex species in relation to sharks and other marine predators that grow indeterminately throughout their lives. 
Using the criterion of apex size classes, the categorisation of sharks as apex predators would be  restricted mainly to adults of large-bodied and wide-ranging species that influence many species within a community. Use of this definition would limit the term apex predator to large individuals (>3 m) such as older juvenile or adult white, tiger, hammerhead and dusky sharks...
(and adult Bull Sharks!)

Most shark species and size classes are in fact best described in the role of mesopredator. 
The ecological role of sharks within the diverse and impacted marine environment requires careful consideration. 

There you have it.

And the same undoubtedly applies to the terms of keystone and umbrella species that are so liberally bandied about by some quarters within the movement!

You can read the whole paper here.

And there's one more interesting observation, and I cite.

Our size-based view of the classification of predatory roles raises important questions about what objectives to manage, and how these objectives can be best achieved.

Protection of reef communities through marine protected areas (MPAs) or fisheries regulation (or indeed, naturally on those few locations far from human population centres) would ensure the mesopredator sharks on these reefs are sheltered from fishing pressure. However, the same may not be true for apex predators because their broad movement patterns and large home ranges (Meyer et al. 2009) would expose them to a greater diversity of fishing fleets and gears, and thus a greater overall mortality than the smaller-ranging, reef-dwelling mesopredators. Hence, the apex predators of coral reefs may be silently eliminated by offshore pelagic longline fisheries, unbeknownst to those managing reef diversity and function (Cox et al. 2002).

Therefore, reef-based MPAs are not adequate to protect these species.

296 Fig. 2. Conceptual diagram outlining the loss of apex predators from reef regions and corresponding system responses where a marine protected area (MPA) is present (upper) or absent (lower). Presence of MPAs leads to different states of equilibrium on individual reefs

Avoiding and mitigating these impacts may require consideration of the ecosystem- and jurisdiction-crossing movements of apex species and size classes. Therefore, management needs to consider not only the effect of reef-based spatial closure, but the amount of time these regions provide shelter to large, mobile, apex species.

This of course eminently important for the SRMR

There, the range of the Bulls and especially the Tigers is clearly much larger than the MPA proper - but this is exactly why we did establish the Fiji Shark Corridor that is conferring a solid, albeit not perfect degree of protection to our Bulls. The possibly highly migratory Tigers, alas, probably not so much - tho we will likely never know as the observed competitive exclusion may well end up masking any losses due to fishing.

This is why the river nursery work is so vital.

Compared to the large and relatively inaccessible ranges of the adults, those nurseries are discrete and relatively small areas where conservation measures may well be easier to implement. We know that the Fijian rivers do not only feature juvenile Bulls but also juveniles of the endangered and probably highly migratory Scalloped Hammerhead - and I betcha that upon closer inspection, we'll also find Nurses and Lemons. 

And once we dispose of the necessary data, we will certainly do our darn best to have those habitats protected!

But I'm digressing as always.

Brilliant paper - enjoy!

Lethal Sampling

There are about 5,000 Tigers left in the wild.
What would you say if some Tiger researcher published a paper claiming that it was OK for scientists to go kill a few in order to collect data that would be essential for their management and conservation. How about Giant Pandas, population 2,000 - OK to go shoot a couple?
No way? Thought so!

Or take a species with a reasonably robust population size.
Orcas, population approx. 50,000: would it be OK for scientists to go kill a few in order to collate better data?
Still not convinced?

And Great Whites, population 3,500?
Perfectly fine to go kill a few!, say Ozzie Shark researchers Heupel and Simpfendorfer - and please read the comments by WhySharksMatter here.

Abstract:

General consensus among scientists, commercial interests, and the public regarding the status of shark populations is leading to an increasing need for the scientific community to provide information to help guide effective management and conservation actions.
Experience from other marine vertebrate taxa suggests that public, political, and media pressures will play an increasingly important part in setting research, management, and conservation priorities.

We examined the potential implications of nonscientific influences on shark research.
In particular, we considered whether lethal research sampling of sharks is justified. Although lethal sampling comes at a cost to a population, especially for threatened species, the conservation benefits from well-designed studies provide essential data that cannot be collected currently in any other way. Methods that enable nonlethal collection of life-history data on sharks are being developed (e.g., use of blood samples to detect maturity), but in the near future they will not provide widespread or significant benefits. Development of these techniques needs to continue, as does the way in which scientists coordinate their use of material collected during lethal sampling.

For almost half of the known shark species there are insufficient data to determine their population status; thus, there is an ongoing need for further collection of scientific data to ensure all shark populations have a future.
Shark populations will benefit most when decisions about the use of lethal sampling are made on the basis of scientific evidence that is free from individual, political, public, and media pressures.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not disputing the need for Shark autopsies, or whatever - though I sure am amazed at the apparent lack of data: what were those fisheries biologists doing during all those past decades of research and data collection, notabene paid for by public funds - huh???

People who lethally sample (a euphemism for going fishing with the intent of killing) Sharks are generally called fishermen.
There must be hundreds of millions of fishermen and last time I looked, 50-odd million Sharks were being lethally sampled each year: are Heupel and Simpfendorfer really suggesting that scientists must go and kill more Sharks on top of that?
That 50 Million dead Sharks are not providing for enough specimen for them to collate their oh-so-important data??? On top of the many Sharks that die by accident during non-lethal sampling by researchers?

Really???

How pathetic is that!
Two years ago, I blogged about some moron who was squandering scarce research funds by going ice fishing for Greenland Sharks instead of analyzing the thousands of Sharks caught by the fishermen. More recently, I've blogged about an arrogant research dude torturing Great Whites (read this - how true!) for a horrible fishing show - which just happens to be on air at this very moment!



They are but two examples of a particularly disturbing breed of researchers who display a fatal disconnect between the quest for scientific insights and the most basic sense of what is right and what is not.

I've since had countless conversations with scientists and especially, providers of research grants about the need to stop squandering resources and to apply stringent ethical imperatives when bankrolling any further scientific research.
Everybody seems to agree, and I'm being told that the the Shark killers tend to be the older researchers and that the majority of the newcomers oppose those methods - which is a good thing!

This shit must stop, period.
It just so happens that in a few days, the very same Heupel and Simpfendorfer will be hosting Sharks International in Cairns. Will somebody there finally speak up against those intolerable shenanigans and the according display of heartlessness and hubris?

Or is it me who just does not get it?