Mens Journal, in it’s October issue has an article on “no cage shark diving”. In that article, Shark Diver is mentioned as offering such dives.”There is definitely a bucket list aspect,” says Martin Graf, who conducts trips in the Bahamas and Gu…
My friend Ingrid Sprake, a project director at Projects Abroad has let me know about an exciting volunteer opportunity, to work with sharks in South Africa.
If you would like to apply for this position, you can do it here
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This project is perfect for anyone with a passion for marine wildlife and the great outdoors. The South African Shark Conservation Project offers you the chance to get up close to some of the most endangered and mis-understood animals in the world whilst working closely with experts in this field to ensure the conservation of these animals. Volunteers are welcome on a gap year, a career break, for university research or as part of a summer holiday.
The Shark Conservation Project is based in the Old Harbour Museum in the coastal town of Hermanus in South Africa. Hermanus is situated on the shores of Walker Bay, which lies at the meeting of two great oceans – the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.
The close proximity to the sea enables the project to have a fully operational marine laboratory equipped with experimental tanks housing captive sharks and a touch-tank for educational purposes. The site also houses an education center where a training and outreach programme is delivered to the community, fishermen & the eco-tourism industry.
Here you will find answers to the following questions:
As a volunteer on the Shark Conservation project you will observe and assist the local scientists with a wide range of on-going and long-term research projects. Your regular activities will include:
A typical working day will run from 7am to 6pm. However, depending on the activities volunteers may be required to start earlier or finish later. Trained local staff are on hand to supervise activities and provide support throughout. The weekly schedule includes conducting lab-based shark behaviour experiments and boat-based shark surveys.
Whilst this project does not include any scuba diving activities, as a volunteer you will have the opportunity to go cage diving with great white sharks, usually once every two weeks. You will also assist in the collection of ecotourism-based data on white sharks. Additionally, volunteers staying longer than 4 weeks will participate in an individual shark identification project. This uses photo ID techniques to develop a catalogue on endemic shark species in Walker Bay.
Part of your stay will include completing the Shark Research Project Course which results in a certification. As part of the course you will see a shark dissection and collect data on a moribund shark.
The primary aims of the Shark Conservation Project in South Africa are to:
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The shark research being carried out on the project in South Africa helps to ensure that scientists and marine protection lobbyists are provided with regular and consistent scientific data about the life history, reproductive information, movement and biology of the sharks found in South African waters. This information is vital for devising successful conservation and management strategies, helping to keep these specific shark species off the critically endangered species lists.
The Shark Conservation Project is based in the Old Harbour Museum in the coastal town of Hermanus in South Africa. Hermanus is situated on the shores of Walker Bay, which lies at the meeting of two great oceans – the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.
Sharks play a crucial role in our oceans. Most sharks serve as apex predators at the top of the marine food pyramid. Directly or indirectly they regulate the natural balance of the marine ecosystems, at all levels, and are therefore an essential part of them. Sharks usually hunt old, weak or sick prey and help to keep the prey population in good condition, enabling these more naturally fit animals to reproduce and pass on their genes.
The Shark Conservation Project in South Africa forms part of Projects Abroad’s Global Shark Campaign, which gives people from various backgrounds and ages the chance to help with the conservation of sharks and marine life. Projects Abroad are embarking on a campaign in 18 countries across four continents to raise awareness on shark conservation.
Volunteers live together in shared accommodation in Hermanus, with 2 – 4 volunteers sharing a room. A local housekeeper looks after the volunteer accommodation and prepares three meals a day. Packed lunches are provided on days in the field.
You will be met at the international airport in Cape Town and be transferred to Hermanus, 1.5 hours away.
The local food consists of plenty of rice, potatoes, bread, chicken and starchy root vegetables. Tropical fruit like papaya, mango, pineapple and watermelon are available in season. Vegetarians can be catered for.
Hermanus offers a variety of activities, including kayaking, fishing, hiking, boat-based whale watching trips (in season). There is also excellent scuba diving, and some of South Africa’s most beautiful beaches. There are many restaurants, art galleries and local shops to visit. Since it is situated only 1.5hours from Cape Town, volunteers can easily access the city and all it has to offer.
You can join the Conservation & Environment project in South Africa for two or three weeks if you don’t have time to join us for four weeks or more. This project has been selected by our local colleagues as being suitable for short term volunteering for both the host community and the volunteer. Although you will gain a valuable cultural insight and work within the local area please be aware that you may not be able to make the same impact as someone volunteering for a longer period.
Again, the link to apply is here and if you would like more information on this and many other volunteer opportunities, you can find it here.
This is your chance to make a real difference.
Cheers,
Martin Graf
CEO Shark Diver
About Shark Diver. As a global leader in commercial shark diving and conservation initiatives Shark Diver has spent the past decade engaged for sharks around the world. Our blog highlights all aspects of both of these dynamic and shifting worlds. You can reach us directly at staff@sharkdiver.com.
Shark Year Magazine just published this:
Western Australian Government to take action to protect human life when necessary due to an imminent shark threat
The State Government has reached an agreement with the Commonwealth Government that will ensure in the event of a shark attack or threat; immediate action can be taken by the Western Australian Government to implement the imminent threat policy.
Premier Colin Barnett said this would enable the State Government to respond quickly in the event of a shark posing a threat, or after an attack.
“It is important that that we can take action to protect human life when necessary due to an imminent threat, without delay,” he said.
“Protocols are being developed to this effect, consistent with Federal environmental law so no ongoing further approvals would be required from the Commonwealth,” Mr Barnett said.
“The Federal and State governments will work together so that the State Government can take appropriate action to protect public safety when there is an imminent threat from a shark, as was the case in the recent attack in Esperance.”
“This approach strikes the necessary balance between protecting public safety and protecting our environment,” he said.
The Premier confirmed the State Government had withdrawn its application for Commonwealth approval of the drum line shark hazard mitigation program.
In light of the recommendations from the Western Australian Environmental Protection Authority, he said that the application to the Commonwealth had been withdrawn.
“We have withdrawn the application after reaching agreement with the Commonwealth which enables us to take immediate action when there is an imminent threat,” Mr Barnett said.
“This will mean we will not need to wait for approvals from Canberra in the event of an imminent threat.”
Source: Government of Western Australia
I wonder, what this really means. What constitutes an imminent threat? I’m not sure that Barnett, who doesn’t seem to know a whole lot about sharks, is a good person to answer that question.Shark diving, swimming with sharks, cage diving, great white sharks,
After diving with great white sharks for 14 years, I’ve come to the conclusion, that these sharks are “predictably unpredictable” and I wouldn’t know, how to reduce the already miniscule risk of a shark attack, other than avoiding certain spots or spots at certain times. In my opinion, if they are concerned about swimmers safety, they should spend the money they use for shark mitigation on additional life guards or better equipment for them. That might actually save some swimmers from drowning, a far greater risk than getting bit by a shark.
We shall see, how this turns out.
We cage dive with great white sharks, swim with sharks at Isla Guadalupe Island.
Martin Graf
CEO Shark Diver
About Shark Diver. As a global leader in commercial shark diving and conservation initiatives Shark Diver has spent the past decade engaged for sharks around the world. Our blog highlights all aspects of both of these dynamic and shifting worlds. You can reach us directly at staff@sharkdiver.com.
There have been quite a few articles written on wether sharks feel pain or not. There is a lot of contention on both sides of the issue and the debate has gotten quite personal and ugly.
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| “Dr. Bob” with big bite marks on his gills. |
“DaShark” has summarized what’s going on quite well and you can read his thoughts in his blog here.
I’m on the fence on the issue myself. I love sharks and personally would like to see a complete ban on shark fishing. Having said that, I know that this is an unrealistic expectation and that is why Shark Diver started the shark free marina initiative and began working with shark tournaments to include a catch and release division. Now catch and release has become highly controversial as well, specially in light of post release mortality and the above mentioned “can sharks feel pain” debate. Catch and release, with it’s post release mortality rate, is certainly not ideal, but it’s far better than catch and kill, with a 100% mortality rate.
As far as the pain is concerned, I’m not a scientist, so I can’t argue with scientific facts. I have been diving with great white sharks at Isla Guadalupe for 14 years and my observations have led me to think that they do not feel pain like we do.
Ila France Porter, in her blog, writes “Since animals cannot tell us how they feel, scientists have searched indirectly for evidence about their subjective experiences, in the studies of neuroanatomy, neurophysiology and behavior. Researchers have developed strict criteria, all of which need to be met, before they can conclude that an animal can feel pain”.
Fish meet all of these criteria, as has been shown in a wide variety of experiments. (Sneddon et al 2003, Reilly et al 2008).
The blog further states that “the animal should be able to learn to avoid a painful stimulus. This should be so important to the animal that it avoids the threat of pain right away. The painful event should strongly interfere with normal behavior — it should not be an instantaneous withdrawal response, but long-term distress.”
and “Yet no evidence has ever been produced to support the idea that an animal could live successfully, and survive, without the ability to feel pain, which is an important warning sensation. It would result in inappropriate behaviour, and the fish would go straight into evolution’s garbage can. Only a small percentage of fish who come into the world live to adulthood, and any weakness would doom them”
My problem with these statement is this. If they are true, how would white sharks, along with other species, whose mating is an extremely painful event, survive? If their feeling of pain causes them to “avoid the threat of pain right away” and “the pain strongly interferes with their normal behavior”, wouldn’t they learn to avoid mating in the first place and thus become extinct?
The very survival of a lot of sharks is dependent on what would be a very painful mating procedure, pain, that this article says the animal feeling it, would avoid at all cost.
I know, this is not going to be popular, but based on the above reasons and my observation of sharks with severe bit wounds, like “Chugey” in this picture, swimming around without any signs of distress, I’m not convinced that they feel pain in any way similar to humans.
Like I stated above, I’m not a fan of catch and release fishing and don’t want people to mistreat any living creature. What I’m saying though is this. If we want something to change, we have to address it scientifically and not emotionally. It’s easy to convince other people who love sharks as much as we do to protect them. If we want to save sharks, we have to convince those who do not share our love for the sharks to change. In order to do that, we need scientific facts and not rhetoric.
Cheers,
Martin Graf
CEO Shark Diver
About Shark Diver. As a global leader in commercial shark diving and conservation initiatives Shark Diver has spent the past decade engaged for sharks around the world. Our blog highlights all aspects of both of these dynamic and shifting worlds. You can reach us directly at staff@sharkdiver.com.
Frightened of the water? Go swimming with great whites. that is the heading of an article in the “Telegraph”, published a couple of days ago.
Catchy phrase! So is this article really about conquering the fear of sharks? Well, I don’t think so. The article is really about Jean Marie Ghislain, one of the guys we have written about here when we talked about the out of cage diving that is going on at Guadalupe Island on various occasions. We all know that it is illegal to do so and, if anything were to happen on those dives, could threaten all the shark diving operations there.
Jean-Marie Ghislain posted pictures like this.
When we wrote about him, he of course was outraged by my comments and responded with this statement.
“Hello Martin, I am the owner of those images and I was very surprised to see them on the blog article you posted. I would like to ask you to immediatly remove them from the web as well as the comments that concerns them- which dont correspond to the reality in that specific situation. The person who is facing the shark had to push the shark away as it was a very intrusive personality and he touched it as little as he could and the dive was aborted immediatly. I don’t want the images to be used in a provocative way when they don’t reflect the reality of what happened. And I especially don’t condone or encourage physical contacts with sharks, but in this specific instance, it could not be avoided by the diver- as I said, he got out of the water right away after the occurence. I am looking forward to hearing from you soon, Thank you, Jean-Marie Ghislain”
So after removing the “offending” pictures and publishing his response here, he is now featured in this article on the “Telegraph”
Jean Marie Ghislain is quoted as saying. “One day in Guadalupe [an island off Baja California in Mexico] three of us were swimming with two great whites. One was a young macho who just wanted us out of the water. But there was this huge, five-metre female who was the coolest shark I’ve ever met. She played with us for one and a half hours and she wanted the contact – she was free to move wherever she wanted, but she clearly wanted company.”
When I said they were not having shark conservation on their minds, while they did this out of cage diving, but rather did this for a “look at me” publicity stunt, Ghislain was outraged and asked me to remove that comment immediately. He said that it didn’t correspond to the reality of that specific situation and that they left the water immediately when the shark got too “intrusive”. Now Ghislain has the guts to publish the comment above.
Turns out that the article is not really about conquering the fear of sharks, but rather a promotion for his book “shark: fear and beauty”. Again, no self interest involved here at all! “sharkcasm” intended.
It is really bad, when guys can blatantly disregard a law, endanger all the other operators at Guadalupe and pretend it’s about shark conservation. Make no mistake, this is not about shark conservation, or getting people to conquer their fear of sharks. This is all about self promotion and making money.
Cheers,
Martin Graf
CEO Shark Diver
About Shark Diver. As a global leader in commercial shark diving and conservation initiatives Shark Diver has spent the past decade engaged for sharks around the world. Our blog highlights all aspects of both of these dynamic and shifting worlds. You can reach us directly at staff@sharkdiver.com.
Great news out of Fiji. “DaShark” has just sent me an email, letting me know that the Shark Reef Marine Reserve Fiji has been officially designated a National Marine Park. Celebration from Dave emery on Vimeo.Thanks to all the guys and gals at Beqa Adv…
Finally, after years of careful research and countless hours spent analyzing shark bite data from all over the world, after comparing all the shark repelling products on the market, we at Shark Diver have found the one shark repellent that works in giv…
This is for all of you who are thinking that it is a good idea to go outside of a cage and dive with Great White Sharks and say that they treat you as one of their own. Check out this video shark diving, great white shark diving, swimming with great wh…
Marie Tartar has posted some great pictures and written a blog about her recent trip to Guadalupe Island with us.Cage diving, swimming with sharks, shark diving, at Isla Guadalupe. experience a real shark weekOn her FB page she writes. “Just when you t…
Just how rough a life do Great White Sharks have? We have talked about the amazing healing power of these amazing animals here and it looks like they really need that ability to heal. Chugey, the shark we were talking about in that blog, is back at Gua…
