Citizen Science - Comments by Christine Ward Paige!

Thank you Christine!

Remember this post?

It did generate a spirited debate where I once again reiterated my personal distaste for the all-pervasive duplication and lack of coordination in Shark research, and the resulting frustration of both the donors and the divers alike. Once again, the gist of my post is not that I believe that Ryan's initiative is a bad thing in itself - what I bemoan is that lacking the necessary coordination with other data bases, it further fragments the global effort which ultimately leads to worse, not better science.

Now Christine has attempted to chime in, but her comment was truncated due to the space limitations of the comments section of Blogger.

Here it is in its entirety.
 

Hi all,

A few comments from my experience…

1. If people are taking their (limited) time to submit data, the goal should be to get as much useful information efficiently.
   In 2004, I started collecting a lot of information, but quickly found that there were too many missing records for many of the variables that were being collected, such as sex, behaviour, habitat, depth, etc. Generally, if a question will generate >5% missing data then it is removed from the analysis and therefore a waste of time to collect in the first place. Data for data sake is not my goal. People are busy and donating their time, so I only aim to collect data that I can use.


2. To reiterate Mike’s point, I think we can safely move beyond collecting data on single species groups, such as sharks.
   I started with just sharks and rays as proof that recreational divers could provide useful data that the scientific community and governments would accept and use to inform conservation and management strategies. And they have! I was told that the results of the eManta_eShark survey (paper was in review at the time) were used in back room conversations at CITES COP 2013 and were influential for at least 2 countries in voting to list mantas on Appendix II. Similarly, the Bahamas protected their sharks following a paper that was published in 2010 that used the REEF.org data – recreational diver generated dataset - which showed the uniqueness of the Bahamas shark populations.
   Note: The REEF.org dataset is the most valuable dataset that I use and I could not do my work without it. It is the template that I used to create eShark and allows me to fill the gap that Johann M identifies, which is the accuracy of reports. However…


3. I think we – those coming from the scientific side of things - need to be careful not to suggest that scientific divers are perfect, or that recreational divers are not good at identification.
   Way back when, when I started this work, many scientists said I couldn’t use recreational diver data because they couldn’t identify/count them properly …something about them “worrying about keeping their masks on their face”, which is so ridiculous in my opinion. So, I tested the shark scientists, fish biologists, recreational divers, and the general public on their shark identification abilities – covering people from around the world. Let's just say that the only person that got 100% on the test had never dived in their life and was only half way through their undergraduate degree - she just loved sharks.
   In fact, throughout my interviews, I have been amazed at the accuracy of not only the identifications (photo verification), but of people’s memories. Many people have photos that correspond with their observations. I’ve used these dated photos to verify memory accuracy. Especially for the rare observations, some people could remember the exact month when an observation took place more than 5 years earlier. However, I always err on the side of my memory ability, which is really not very good. These inaccuracies, whether by recreational divers, dive masters/instructors or scientists, can be managed with good survey design, reasonable assumptions, awareness of limitations and responsible analysis.


4. When (the late) Ransom Myers and I developed the idea of using divers to census shark and ray populations, an important first step was to ask the dive community about potential concerns for data.
   I specifically asked this question when I was at DEMA and ADEX with Project Aware, which enabled me to cover a wide variety of perspectives and regions of the world. The most important concern raised was that I was creating a dataset that included the location of species that were vulnerable/endangered and still targeted. So, although I think scientists should be open to collaboration, and I certainly am, I think it is irresponsible to make these data freely available or open source and I think we need to be careful who we share it with.
   To get around this, I provide data summaries to different people or groups that request it - e.g., I give (almost) monthly summaries to Shark Guardian on their progress in Thailand - and have contributed data to OBIS, which is open source, but the data are shared according to OBIS recommendations for sensitive species (10x10 degree cells - you can't even tell what country they are in!) so that the lat/lon and seasonality cannot be used by people that aim to do harm to these populations.


5. I agree with you Mike – more collaboration would be valuable.
   I am always on the lookout for other groups that share the my mission and are aligned with eShark. There are a few, including REEF.org, eBird.org, Marine Debris Tracker, and Redmap –Australia that are great and run by very good scientists that know how to use the data. Three of these I featured on eOceans.org for an Oceans Day event in 2014. I didn’t have time to organize this event again this year…


6. I am encouraged by the number of different citizen science surveys now available – we have come a long way since those naysayers of 2004, some of which have actually gone on to create their own diver surveys now!
   But I do appreciate and share Mike’s comments and concerns about diluting and frustrating the people that want to contribute in the best way they can. Of course people cannot contribute to all the existing surveys – I can barely keep track of them all at this stage.

The advice I have for potential contributors is to look at the goals and results of the organization running the survey and ask:

• i) Do they have publications to support their motivation to collect the data?
• ii) Do they have the scientific and statistical expertise to use the data?
• iii) Do they specifically state who will use the data, or do they just generally say ‘collecting for science’?
• iv) Does the organization intend to use the data responsibly and keep it protected from people that may wish to exploit it, or do they have it open source/freely available?

I personally value locally collected data that feeds into a larger picture, which is why Shark Guardian and the Great Fiji Shark Count are so effective and both received awards from Project Aware for their efforts.

Anyway, this is my two cents.

Thanks Mike for prompting me to comment.

Shark Base - more senseless Duplication?

THIS is where you should upload your observations!

I trust you've seen this?

Very slick.

Normally, I would be full of praise, the more as I respect Ryan for SOS and the role it has played in the WA Shark Cull.

And still, it deeply irritates me.

Sharks represent but a tiny subset of marine research and conservation (and incidentally, global fisheries) and the available resources in terms of dedication, time, manpower and funding devoted to them are equally comparably scarce - and with that in mind, it really upsets me when I come across yet another one of those projects that reinvents the wheel and amounts to little more than a fragmentation and squandering of the little means we dispose of.

Because there's already eShark.

Crated by Christine Ward-Paige way back then when nobody cared about citizen science let alone Sharks, this is the original global go-to resource that has already resulted in a wealth of scientific publications and continues to fuel national initiatives like our GFSC (that is incidentally happening as we speak!) or eShark Thailand, and continues to accumulate daily data by divers worldwide via its online survey. As an example, Projects Abroad has been uploading data to eShark for over a year, meaning that together with the BRUV data, Beqa Lagoon is now one of the best documented Shark viewing spots anywhere!
And talking of which, a birdie twitters that eShark may soon become the cornerstone of yet another stellar initiative - so keep watching this space!

And what about us divers.

Every week, we get inundated with yet more bloody requests to partake in some survey from bloody Whales to bloody Seahorses - so can we at least try and stick to one focal point and one methodology per group?

Solutions?

Yes I know I know...

Paper - barf!

Would you hand your money to this man?

Maaaan...

Did you see the headlines - as in here?

And I thought those were only Accidents, as per this pseudoscientific snake oil I've found on the SharkSkool webpage?

Anyway.

Stupid me, I went and got myself the paper.

A friendly researcher writes.

This incredibly poorly-written paper is definitely purely meant to serve as another "tick-mark" under Ritter's name. 

There seems to be so much wrong with this "experiment" that "getting published again" is the only reason that I can see behind this paper. 

My favorite line is "To better understand the relationship between sharks and humans, additional studies, like the one presented here, are a priority." 

I would really love to hear Ritter's ideas on just how exactly this can help us understand our interactions with sharks, and WHY studies like this one should ever be a priority! 

Sharks like to approach from behind, great, on to the next obvious statement.

Indeed!

This is merely the latest in a whole series of amateurish fluff (shark attack rates huh - my-oh-my...) originating from the cooperation of the world's only and thus most important sharkxpert and self professed guru of pseudoscience human-Shark interactions, or whatever, with this dude and with the Jersey girl who was likely conned into squandering (even more) donor money in exchange for some perceived and urgently needed academic legitimacy - not!

So what can I say about this stupidity.

I was going to review it in detail but quite frankly, it's so bad that it's really not worth the effort - and incidentally, talk about a simply epic failure of peer review!

Only this.

Let's assume for the sake of the argument that this was a credible and rigorous experiment (it was not!), and let's focus on the conclusions that in brief consist in the observation that those tested Caribbean Reefies would preferably approach divers from behind, with older animals being more wary and/or wily.

• Dooh.
  Every single Shark I've ever encountered knew exactly when I was looking at it, and has always established eye contact - and so did every single Fish! Ask any spearo how wily those Fishes are, and how they instantly perceive being at the center of attention  - and ask any Shark diver how easily one can stare away Sharks, and how Sharks trying to sneak in from behind will instantly veer away when one looks at them!
  That's what terrestrial and marine predators and prey do.
  They keep an eye on each other, with the predators trying to catch their prey unawares, and the prey trying not to get surprised - and to depict this trivial observation as a great discovery is quite frankly pathetic!

• And the great unexplained mystery, and I cite?
  

  The way predators stalk their prey or sneak up on them is often linked with the avoidance of visual contact with the quarry.
  Such a theory demands that a predator is capable of locating the prey’s eyes or at least recognizing its viewing direction. Neither can be assumed for sharks—as the stalkers—in the vicinity of humans, especially in our design, since the chosen human position did not resemble any known prey for any shark species. Although it cannot be excluded that sharks might still be able to make a comparison to a prey species and act on it, our results do not offer explanations as to what that clue might be. Ritter and Amin (2012) showed that human presence does affect the swim behavior of sharks and that larger animals seem to be more cautious in the vicinity of humans than smaller animals. Our results are consistent with this interpretation, showing a significant preference of the larger animals to approach test-subjects via their blind areas.
  
  Since sharks are evolutionarily more distant from mammals than birds, can it be concluded that human gaze might not be detectable at all and that something entirely different is used by sharks to comprehend a person’s viewing direction?
  A satisfactory answer cannot be given since the shark’s perception and capability of sensory organs are much different from both birds and mammals. Similarly, the different medium could also be of importance. Characteristics of water as a solvent could facilitate a so far unknown human emission that might not carry as well in air.
  
  Could face masks have an effect in choosing the approach direction?
  As with bubbles, such would not be detectable should the shark be too far away. Likewise, a shark would need to understand where the eyes of a person are located, hence not just to know the body proportions be known but also how to read these proportions when presented in a kneeling object.

  Right.
  A so far unknown human emission.
  Sez the great Shark shaman!
  
  How about this for an explanation.
  These are not naive Sharks that have never seen divers - the location of the experiment is in the Northern Abaco Islands, Bahamas = the famous Walker's Cay where literally thousands upon thousands of divers have interacted with Caribbean Reefies!
  For the newbies among you: this was that dive - much copied but never equaled!

Think that those Sharks don't know divers?
Think that they've not observed us like we've observed them, that they're not able to detect our orientation and what we are doing even from a distance, and that they cannot approach us from behind if they wish to do so - with the older and more experienced ones being more wily whilst the younger ones are still learning the ropes?
Hell, the researchers tell us that their cognitive and above all, their learning faculties are impressive, and the Shark diving operators who interact with them on a daily basis will confirm that they even recognize individual people!
This is so trivial to be painful!

Anyway.

All I really wanted to say was, caveat emptor - whilst global Shark populations are going to shit, Ritter and the SRI continue to squander donor money on amateurish and utterly useless experiments.

And if you're not careful, that money may well be yours!

To be continued no doubt!

Dear Mary

Bravo Terry: great Photography amidst a deluge of forgettable pics from Lupe!

I must apologize for the delay in answering your comments.
Thing is, we’re currently incredibly busy (95% doing, 5% ranting) - and I felt that I needed to devote some time to formulating a more exhaustive response.
So there.

First of all, I really want to thank you for having raised your voice in protest - and I commend you for having done it openly.
I know who you are and admire you for your passion, commitment, eloquence and intelligence. We’re clearly not on the same page on this one – but I very much welcome this discussion as I strongly believe that we will only progress by engaging in dialogue, some of which needs to be controversial and robust. And yes, that sometimes includes ranting, especially in the context of a blog like this one!
Let’s however never forget that in the big scheme of things, we’re on the same side and that this is a squabble between friends, not foes!

Let me try to put things into context.
As you know I’m basically a full-time Shark conservationist. I do what I do the way I do it , and I say what I say based on a specific set of assumptions.
Please bear with me if I try and describe them as follows.

Assumption 1

The Big Gorillas are Population Growth and even more problematic (and largely overlooked), the fact that everybody is striving to attain a “better” life which in practical terms translates into increasing one’s Ecological Footprint.
That is simply not sustainable and if left unchecked, the future looks grim indeed – as in: there will be no future!
If so, we will descend into Chaos and Anarchy, and Conservation will be the least of our concerns.

Assumption 2

One of the immediate consequences of the above is that Life expressed in terms of Biodiversity is experiencing a severe bottleneck, especially when it comes to terrestrial habitats where anthropogenic extinctions are rampant.
Hopefully, we will come to the conclusion that this is not what we want (Ed Wilson’s Biophilia) and if we do, the future will consist in some form of less diverse “Nature” which will however not just “be”, but which we will have to actively manage.
Yes that includes Shark stocks, too!

Assumption 3

When it comes to the Oceans, I believe that the situation is somewhat different.

I believe that we generally grossly under-estimate the size, fecundity and regenerative powers of Marine ecosystems.
Yes there’s widespread pollution, habitat degradation and blatant overfishing: but despite of our best efforts, it appears that we’ve “only” managed to exterminate a small number of Marine Mammals, no Marine Cetaceans and, possibly with the exception of some obscure deep-sea Sharks, zero Marine Fishes!

Yes the Cod, Orange Roughy and Chilean Sea Bass fisheries have collapsed and the Northern Bluefin Tuna appears to be critically endangered – but there are still Cod, Orange Roughies and Chilean Seabass and Northern Bluefins and if we just leave them alone, populations will very likely recover. We may pollute and bomb a Reef to smithereens: but just leave it alone, and it will miraculously recover within the shortest period of time.

Those, I understand, are the facts – I’m not saying that this is great and that we should thus feel free to continue to reap and pillage: but anthropogenic terrestrial and marine extinction rates are clearly very different.

Consequently, I advocate the creation of a multitude of MPAs (the more and bigger, the better) where Biodiversity can shelter in order to re-colonize the surroundings once we finally decide to just leave them alone.
That’s the good news.

Assumption 4

The bad news is that anthropogenic Climate Change and especially, its ugly cousin Ocean Acidification (read this!) may indeed tip the scale towards a total collapse of Marine habitats and related widespread Marine extinctions.
If so, all for which we so valiantly fight (and rant) will have been for naught.

But one has to choose one’s fights and like in the case of the Big Gorillas, this is not where I’ve chosen to be active. We at BAD are however certainly trying to make a (ridiculously small) contribution by always trying to reduce our Carbon footprint and advocating a greener lifestyle.
Let’s just hope that a Nobel Prize and an Oscar will prove sufficient to sway the masses (and the politicians!) to do the right thing – tho after Copenhagen, I’m far from believing that this is anywhere close to being a done deal…

Assumption 5

Species protection does not work. What works is habitat protection.

Assumption 6

I believe that the totality of resources (as in people, brain power, time and money) available to Conservation (and incidentally, to Research) is finite.
And not only that: the sum has been decreasing due to the global recession and also due to the plethora of other competing “worthy” causes, as in Haiti, AIDS, teenage pregnancies, poverty alleviation and-so-on-and so forth – many of which, alas, are directly contributing to making the Big Gorilla even bigger!

If the above is true, and I believe it is, we are looking at a classical zero sum game whereby if we invest any resources into a particular project, we are automatically crippling other projects.

To me, the inevitable consequence of the above is that we must define our priorities and invest those resources prudently and with a view to attaining the best possible results in the most effective and efficient way – very much like the ROI in the “real” world.
And like in the “real” world, we have an obligation to question the efficiency and effectiveness of those different projects and to hold the project leaders accountable - for their success but also for their failure, and this in absolute terms but also, in relative terms when compared to possible alternatives!

Take The Cove: all that hype and praise irritates me!
The movie decries the fact that some Japanese trap some Dolphins, a non-endangered species, in Japan. Some are exported for Dolphin shows; some are killed in unethical ways and then eaten. Certainly all very disturbing - but that's a (legitimate) animal welfare and not a conservation issue!

Did I hear: "sentient being"? And the Vaquita? Please read the link!
Couldn’t all those resources have helped in trying to reverse the decline of the Vaquita, maybe the most critically endangered Cetacean – the more as its demise is very much happening just south of the border? And who, please, is fighting for the Yangtze Dolphin?

Am I entitled to ask those questions?

I also believe that in this day-and-age, the only justification for investing those scarce resources into biological Research is that it directly benefits Conservation and that it satisfies the most stringent ethical imperatives.
And, we must strive to avoid redundant duplications (please, no more tagging of Pacific GWs!), we must oblige scientists to collaborate (which they mostly do) and we must ask that those scientists we finance produce regular results as expressed in scientific publications, etc.

As an example, I’m highly distressed when I hear that Taxonomy, the science that documents Biodiversity, is on the decline, to the point that an increasing number of Institutions are dropping it from the curriculum, that the current Taxonomists have issues of succession and that funding for expeditions is drying up.
Did you know that Jack Randall, the greatest Fish Taxonomist in history, is currently unemployed and unfunded? How is that possible???

And why are there so many competing research projects, NGOs and initiatives targeting the very same issues and incidentally, squandering so much money on aggregate overhead? How can that be beneficial to the cause?
In that regard, Kudos for having established the SSN – very much the way to go!

Now when it comes to Shark Conservation, which is what I do.

Assumption 7

I believe that apart from the doomsday scenarios of Climate Change and Ocean Acidification, the biggest threat to Sharks is overfishing.
In that, I’m partly contradicting my previous argument about the Ocean’s unbridled regenerative powers. I do this in view of the fact that Sharks have a much lower fecundity than most Fishes and that some populations seem to be quite small, as in, apparently, 3-4,000 in the case of GW and maybe even less for some deep-water species.

Assumption 8

I however also believe that the status of Shark stocks is not uniformly catastrophic but that it varies according to species and to regions.
The consequence is that in order to be credible and efficient, we should prioritize our resources in order to direct them to the preservation of those species that are most threatened.
Trivial – but are we doing so?

Assumption 9

The ultimate solution to overfishing is not prohibition, it is to fish sustainably.
This is a central theme of this blog.
The sooner we accept that, the sooner we'll be able to help the Sharks.

In a nutshell, I believe that killing Sharks for food is OK as long as it is done sustainably.
This means that where they are depleted, stocks must be allowed to recover and after that, fishing quotas must remain below the rate of replenishment. I believe that to be true of all fisheries, be it for Sardines, Tuna, Sharks or, yes, Whales!

The practice of finning however is a completely different topic: it is ethically reprehensible for being both wasteful and extremely cruel and needs to be stopped.

Assumption 10

I believe that the fisheries for Sharks (i.e. mainly for their fins) is supply limited, meaning that the demand for Shark Fins greatly outweighs the supply. This is why Shark fins remain one of the most expensive marine commodities.

No clue why the soup has gone down-market.
Maybe because the Shark fishermen catch more Sharks? Maybe because they have reduced their overhead/fin by becoming more efficient? Maybe because cheaper soups contain less desirable and thus cheaper fins? Maybe because there are less fins in one unit of cheap soup?

Anyway, if that is true, I believe that targeting the demand is a very very long shot indeed!
Take your example: 200 posters were noticed by 19% of Beijingers, of which 82% said that they would forego the soup – gives a penetration of 16%.
Now, as I said, if the demand were 4 times the supply, you would need a penetration of more than 75% before a single Shark (!!!) would be spared! How many eaters of soup are there? How many is 75% of that? How many posters would have to be deployed where? How much would that cost?
Is that realistic? Is that the best possible way of investing those resources?
And if it is not – may I criticize it?

One common friend sent me a message stating that when Shark conservationists squabble, no Sharks are being saved.
I disagree! “Squabbling” about the most efficient strategies does save Sharks if it improves the strategies and saves more Sharks! And again, this is never meant ad personam, at least not by yours truly – tho I understand that it may come across as such, which is deplorable but sometimes inevitable!

Anyway, with that in mind, I believe that Shark Conservation should target the supply side by concentrating on the Countries where the Sharks are being caught and exported from and where their demise is creating the biggest negative impact.
Yes that may sometimes be a long shot, too – but I strongly believe that given the right amount of resources and flanked by education and alternatives for the fishermen, it still is the better strategy.

I believe this to be true because it is in the ultimate interest of those Countries to preserve their stocks at sustainable levels and to avoid the collapse of their Marine Ecosystems.

The bulk of the consumers, on the other hand, must only contend with issues of availability and price, and if you’re lucky, with ethical considerations - IMO, not a very strong motivator for changing one’s habits.
Sure did nothing for Rhinos and Elephants, another supply limited commodity – whereas protecting them in Africa seems to work.

And talking of ethics: this is why I did propose the certified Shark Fin soup as an alternative to changing habits altogether.

With that in mind, I believe that the way to go is as follows – and yes, think “Rhinos and Elephants”.

A. The establishment of MPAs in order to preserve the Sharks’ habitats.
Here, I believe that we already dispose of a global network that needs to be activated, and that is us in the Dive Industry. Every single dive operator should be held accountable for protecting the resource he derives his sustenance from – this not only because it’s only fair and ethical, but also because it’s good business!

As an example, the single most photographed, filmed and loved Shark in the Universe is Emma.
So, why are all those countless Emma- and Shark-loving bigwigs not actively engaged in getting Emma and Tiger Beach protected – or are they, very much silently, petition-less and behind the scenes? Yes the “political” situation is complicated and some feathers may well get ruffled – but then, when was Conservation easy? And how much sweeter could success possibly be?
Or am I just ranting – again?

B. The establishment of pro-Shark legislation.
No widespread conservation is possible without the adequate legislative framework.
Achieving this is not trivial but certainly not impossible. Most Governments are open to good arguments, the principal one being that the indiscriminate slaughter of Sharks has devastating effects rippling down through the trophic chain, all the way to the demise of entire Marine ecosystems.

Generally, this consists in advocating sustainable fisheries and ideally, moratoriums (all the way to Shark Sanctuaries) as long as some stocks are too depleted or until there are sufficient data to determine sustainable levels.
The recent protection of Lemon Sharks in Florida is an excellent example of the former and the Honduran moratorium, an excellent example of the latter.
Kudos!

Can this be replicated in, say, Yemen? I betcha it can – but somebody has to go and do it! Who, and who’s going to pay for that?
And how about Ecuador, Colombia, Costa Rica and Mexico where the fishermen are slaughtering “our” Scalloped Hammerheads? Don’t know if it has: but if not, shouldn’t Sharkwater rather be translated into Spanish and be shown there, where it happens?

How many Shark fishing countries have no pro-Shark legislation and what can be done to change that?

C. Which leads me straight over to the need for effective enforcement.
Now this is really the biggest challenge of them all. Here, we are confronted with a lack of resources, often coupled with indifference and corruption, especially in lesser developed countries. This I believe is where we need to direct the bulk of our resources, be it in terms of personal efforts, funds and hardware but also, education and the establishment of alternatives for the fishermen.

In Fiji, we currently compensate the fishermen for not fishing in the MPA but also employ Fish Wardens who have the authority to enforce the law.
And we’re pretty big in outreach, via the local media all the way to a local PSA but also, our youth sponsorship program and presentations to local communities.
In the future, we would like to expand Shark awareness to the school curriculum – but we simply lack the necessary time and manpower and are thus currently trying to outsource it to one of the local NGOs.

D. We should also sponsor research so that our decisions are backed by objective data.
As you know, this is one of the cornerstones of our Fiji Project.

E. "Other"?

Shark Free Marinas Initiative anybody?
Yes the initiator may, or may not be the Antichrist – but is it saving Sharks? Incredibly efficiently so, as signing up costs precisely zero?
21 in Fiji – and how many in the USA? Australia? South Africa? Asia?
How about that for petty squabbling and tribalism huh.

Petitions?
My hunch is that they only make sense when coupled with real action “on the ground”.
Thus, I believe that the Florida Lemon Shark petition and the Hawaii Shark Preservation letter campaign were useful in reinforcing the arguments of the people pursuing those local projects. I believe that the Discovery petition was largely a flop because nobody really cared to go and pursue any direct follow-up with the network – though having said this, I hear that things there may be changing, hopefully for the better.
The other petitions, to me, are just a total waste of time – especially all those competing “stop finning” gigs! More than happy to be proven wrong though!

Activism?
Not convinced!
Conservation is about hard facts, hard and often tedious work, perseverance and commitment, often difficult negotiations.
Yes, and of course passion – but passion alone just aint good enough!

All-to-often, activism is just too hopelessly amateurish, too emotional, too little fact-based, too confrontational and too little solution-oriented. Too often, I fear that it harms rather than being helpful. Too often, I get the impression that the perpetrators are mainly interested in personal aggrandizement and that the initiatives are nothing but marketing stunts – and this includes many of those pro-Shark websites which are so long on pontificating and petitions and so short on results!

And what about our own ideologies and stereotypes. Very unhelpful.
“Sharks” are not “misunderstood”, at least not by the people who take the time to learn about them! People who don’t take the time to learn about dogs “misunderstand” them – wow, what a profound message!
Which species are we talking about anyway: Whale Sharks? Cookie Cutters? Swell Sharks?
Do we “understand” them?

Yes I’m being facetious - but seriously: our biggest capital is to be honest and objective, especially when we are trying to counter the anti-Shark stereotypes!
Romanticizing interactive encounters with large predatory Sharks is stupid and as such, bad marketing. Using numbers that are based on conjecture and untested (although certainly plausible) hypotheses is counter productive. Right now, the only verified number is approx. 30 to 70, which is 50 and not 100, full stop – and that’s just a number, it says nothing about sustainability which is all that counts!

Can we maybe just be a little more humble and less righteous, the more since Conservation is so complicated? Maybe progress towards more facts and less truthiness (read this!)?
Can we maybe just open our eyes and wonder at the magnificence of what is instead of trying to make things up?

In a way, it is the very deluge of platitudes, pseudoscience and exaggerated doomsday scenarios in all those pedestrian wannabee Sharkwater clones that has helped spawn rubbish like Shark Con – and I’m certainly gonna leave it at that, the more as I firmly believe that we should just ignore it and not contribute to its marketing by engaging in the usual vociferous con-troversies!

We are the amateurs.
Can we please listen to what the professionals are telling us – the principal message being that extreme positions (on both sides!) are inhibiting Conservation and appropriate Management measures?

There you have it Mary!
This is basically where I personally come from - and yes, alas, it includes a lot of skepticism!
But having said this, we’ve certainly come a long long way and I remain very hopeful that we will succeed in turning things around!

Dunno if I’ve managed to adequately address your reservations.
But I’m thankful for having been given the chance to put things into context.

You too, take care!

Certified Shark Fin Soup?

Once again, I'm irritated.

A friend has just sent me the link to the following Video.

Let's start with the positives.
It's by two Shark advocates, Alex Hofford & Paul Hilton who are being described as "passionate", it highlights the global plight of Sharks and the barbaric practice of finning, and it features a nice clip on 6:58 of Scarface, all of which is great.

On the negative side, it starts with the usual incorrect statement and is painfully long and tedious. Anything beyond three minutes needs to be absolutely brilliant, or the viewer will loose interest - and I'm afraid that this just isn't.
Plus, as so often, I fear that like the Sea Shepherd clip, it achieves nothing tangible. It's laudable in its intention, certainly personally rewarding for its authors - but alas, it's irrelevant in terms of reducing the number of Sharks that are being killed for their fins.

Let me elaborate - once again.
Shark fisheries are supply limited, meaning that the demand for Shark fins greatly outweighs the supply, and this by orders of magnitude.
Does anybody dispute this?

And if not, why do all those people insist in squandering all that money, time and energy in trying to "re-educate" the consumers of Shark fin soup?
Who are we to tell those people what to eat anyway?

But more importantly, it just doesn't make sense!
If the demand for Shark fins is, say, three times the supply, then we would have to convince more than two thirds of all potential consumers in order to have any effect in reducing the number of Sharks being killed! If it's four times, more than three fourths! Get the gist?
How many people would that be?

Does anybody really believe that this can be achieved via those fashionable Beijing posters, the translation of Sharkwater into Mandarin, videos like this one, or one of those countless competing petitions?
Really? Will they succeed in convincing hundreds of millions of people to change their behavior????

C'mon guys, get real!
I've said it before and will continue to say it: the solution to overfishing is to promote sustainable fisheries, not prohibition. That is where we need to direct our energy and our scarce conservation Dollars, not into ineffective activism!

Ideas?
Southern Fried Science have re-visited the issue of Supply Side Conservation in this post.
Can we maybe adapt some of those recommendations to Sharks?

Dolphin-free Tuna was certainly very bad for the Tuna and an ecological disaster on top of that - but it was great for Dolphins. Following the recommendations of Seafood Watch has become fashionable and works. In my lifetime, the fashionable and ubiquitous Lady Curzon was replaced by Mockturtle and Trepang soup. As we speak, the unsustainable Caviar is gradually being replaced by surrogates. I've seen people pay a premium for eggs from happy free-range chucks.
Consumers may not be willing to completely change their habits, but they can certainly be educated and convinced to choose better products if presented with alternatives - and I see no reason why this would not apply to the consumers of Shark Fin soup.

Maybe one could work with the Shark Fin Industry and create a brand of certified Shark fin soup? From Sharks that have not been finned? From species that are not being overfished?
Could one develop a surrogate?

Just a suggestion.
Certainly more tedious and less fashionable and thus less personally rewarding than making a lot of noise and dishing out money for a good cause - but I believe, better for the Sharks.
And that's what ultimately counts.

Or not?

Very funny!

The Blue Blogs are unleashing.

South Park has taken on Sea Shepherd and many out there have taken that as a pretext to reaffirm their deep misgivings about Capt. Watson's brand of conservation activism.

Prima vista, as a conservationist and as a businessman, I would have to agree.
Whereas others perform miracles within very small budgets, the SSCS appears very short on tangible results - especially when compared to their marketing and to the obvious costs of operating their fleet. It's an ongoing thread of this blog: the money available for conservation and research is finite, a zero sum, and seeing it squandered on a whole lot of hot air instead of being used effectively is profoundly disturbing.

Then again, there may well be a need for clowns and extremists to pave the way for the more moderate, realist and above all, result- and compromise-oriented faction of conservation.

Thing is, when it comes to Cetaceans, the latter appears to be largely non-existent.
I'm not really terribly interested in Whales and Dolphins and may have missed some of the finer points: but from the little I can see, the "movement" is dominated by a highly emotional and all-to-often, frighteningly New-Age-esque agenda that depicts the animals as some sort of preternatural beings and where any attempt at engaging in rational conversation inevitably leads to teary eyes and outright aggression.
Very irritating and sad, really, as any lasting conservation measures will ultimately have to be based on pragmatic compromises - and yes, I'm repeating myself!

But in the end, it's just not one of my wars and I'll keep it like Eric below.
As always, South Park has managed to expose them all and the result is just simply hilarious.
Well done for saying it as it is!

Enjoy!