Saving Seafood

Artificial Reefs Take on a Towering Presence as Havens for Marine Predators

September 10, 2020 — The following was released by Duke University:

Acting like high-rise timeshares in the sea, shipwrecks and other artificial reefs can support dense populations of sharks, mackerels, barracudas, jacks and other large migratory marine predators essential to ocean health, according to a new study at 30 sites along the North Carolina coast.

Predator densities were up to five times larger at the 14 artificial reefs surveyed in the study than at the 16 nearby natural reefs that also were surveyed

Shipwrecks, especially those that rose between 4 and 10 meters up into the water column, were by far the fishes’ favorite. At some sites, they supported predator densities up to 11 times larger than natural reefs or low-profile artificial reefs made of concrete.

“These finding tell us two important things. One is that artificial reefs can support large predators, potentially supplementing natural reefs if the design and placement of the artificial reefs are strategic,” said Avery Paxton, research associate with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) in Beaufort, N.C., who led the study.

“The second thing it tells us is that when it comes to designing artificial reefs, there may be such a thing as a height advantage. We observed more fast-moving predators that live and hunt in the water column at the taller reefs in our study,” she said.

Climate change, pollution, development and other stresses have accelerated the decline of natural reef ecosystems across much of the world’s oceans in recent years, forcing large predators who formerly fed in the water column around the reefs to venture outside their normal migratory routes and native ranges in search of suitable alternatives.

Because these predators help maintain healthy and sustainable populations of species lower in the food web, providing suitable habitat for them as expediently as possible is critical, said Brian Silliman, Rachel Carson Distinguished Professor of Marine Conservation Biology at Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment, who collaborated on the study.

Read the full release here

International Crime Ring That Trafficked in Shark Fins Is Dismantled, U.S. Says

September 8, 2020 — Shark fin soup, considered a delicacy in some countries, has long fueled demand for illegally harvested fins. But federal authorities in Georgia announced this week that they had dismantled at least one source for the ingredient: a multimillion-dollar organization they described as an international money laundering, drug trafficking and illegal wildlife trade ring.

A dozen people, including Terry Xing Zhao Wu, 45, of Burlingame, Calif., and two businesses on opposite ends of the country face multiple charges, including fraud and money laundering, for their roles in what the authorities called the “Wu transnational criminal organization,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Georgia said in a statement on Thursday.

“United with our partner agencies, we have shut down an operation that fed a seemingly insatiable overseas appetite for illegally traded wildlife, and seized ill-gotten assets derived from that despicable criminal enterprise,” Bobby L. Christine, the U.S. attorney for the district, said in the statement.

Read the full story at The New York Times

The Dark Side of Being a Female Shark Researcher

August 27, 2020 — I was 21 years old when I encountered the place where sharks and television intersect. It was my first research internship, working with a famous shark scientist I had long admired but only just met. My second week, I was on a boat with a film crew, chumming for sharks in the background while the senior scientist dispensed expertise in the foreground. At one point, the film crew suggested I sit next to my hero on camera and repeat the prompt: “So, [Dr. Hero], why did you become a shark scientist?”

For the beautiful green-eyed assistants, of course,” he replied, gesturing at me. I froze, silent, a nervous half-smile on my face.

Don’t worry,” a member of the film crew assured me afterward. “We won’t use it.” I felt a wash of relief and gratitude. It was years before I thought to wonder why I’d felt I was the one who would have looked bad if they had.

This isn’t the worst experience I’ve had as a woman in shark science, or even in the top 10. It barely makes my list at all. I remember it mainly for how small and ashamed it made me feel in the first moments of my career as a scientist; for the way his joke told me clearly who I was to him, and how he thought I fit into the story.

Read the full story at Scientific American

Are All U.S. Sharks Overfished?

August 10, 2020 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:

The world’s oceans are home to around 500 species of sharks. With so many species, it’s difficult to talk about the status of shark stocks overall. Regardless of the species, federal laws and regulations work to ensure that shark fisheries in the United States are healthy going into the future.

Read the facts below to learn more about what it means to be overfished and how we sustainably manage our shark fisheries.

1. U.S. law requires that shark fishing rules foster long-term biological and economic sustainability.

Fishery management in U.S. federal waters is governed primarily by the Magnuson-Stevens Act. First passed in 1976, the act requires that all fishery management plans meet 10 National Standards. That means the approximately 50 species of sharks managed in federal waters are fished under rules designed to:

  • Prevent overfishing
  • Rebuild overfished stocks
  • Increase long-term economic and social benefits of fisheries
  • Ensure a safe and sustainable seafood supply

Gulf of Mexico blacktip sharks are a good example of these rules at work. A popular food fish, blacktip sharks experienced a slight population decline in the 1990s. We established a quota specifically for this population in 2015. That combined with retention limits tied to other commercially valuable species contributed to a higher population today than the target level set by scientists.

Learn more about U.S. fisheries management

Understand why U.S.-caught sharks are a sustainable food choice

2. The terms “overfished” and “threatened” mean different things.

It’s a common misconception that overfished species are at risk of extinction. But the categories of overfished and overfishing are not directly related to threatened and endangered designations under the Endangered Species Act.

To understand the difference, it helps to know another term: maximum sustainable yield. This is the largest catch level that a species can sustain over a long period of time. If a stock is declared overfished, that means its numbers have fallen too low to produce its maximum sustainable yield. An overfished status doesn’t say anything directly about whether the species is endangered or likely to become endangered.

NOAA Fisheries is dedicated to rebuilding overfished stocks. Of the 43 shark stocks managed in the Atlantic Ocean, six are overfished. We have put rebuilding plans in place for each of these with strict catch limits based on the best available science. These limits are closely monitored and enforced.

Learn more about efforts to rebuild sandbar shark populations

Learn more about how retention limits help us sustainably manage shark fisheries

3. Our largest shark fisheries target healthy stocks.

The vast majority of sharks harvested in the United States are species with above-target population levels. In the Atlantic, for example, 94 percent of all U.S. shark landings in 2018—including bycatch—were of five species, which are neither overfished nor subject to overfishing:

  • Spiny dogfish shark
  • Smooth dogfish shark
  • Gulf of Mexico blacktip shark
  • Atlantic sharpnose shark
  • Finetooth shark

Two of these—spiny dogfish and Gulf of Mexico blacktip—have actually experienced population growth over recent decades.

Learn more about how spiny dogfish have benefited from sustainable management

Read the full release here

BOSTON HERALD: Feds offer more protections to seals than humans

August 4, 2020 — Maine’s first shark-caused human fatality came as a shock to residents and vacationers alike, but the odds of that occurring in Massachusetts waters increase virtually daily, thanks to conservation efforts that have swelled both seal and shark populations.

Authorities have confirmed that a 63-year-old woman from New York City was killed by a great white shark on Monday while swimming with her daughter off Harpswell, Maine’s Bailey Island.

Julie Dimperio Holowach became the first known person to die from a shark attack in Maine’s history, Patrick Keliher, the state’s Marine Patrol Commissioner, said at a Tuesday press conference.

Holowach, wearing a wetsuit, was swimming with her daughter about 20 yards from the shore when she was attacked. Thankfully her daughter escaped injury.

Read the full story at The Boston Herald

Finding more sharks off Maine’s coast could change our relationship with the ocean

July 31, 2020 — Three days after a great white killed a swimmer off Bailey Island in Harpswell, officers from the Maine Marine Patrol continued to scour coastal waters for sharks by land and by sea.

If they find a great white shark, they won’t kill it. Instead, state officials mostly seek information to document the presence of sharks and alert coastal communities.

Scientists and researchers also hope to learn more information about the species, saying that photos and reports of sharks and seals killed by sharks are helpful to them. Those can be shared with their local marine patrol officer, including as much specific information as possible.

“They tell us what species the shark is biting, where and when that’s happening, and the potential size and shape of the shark based on bite wounds,” Greg Skomal, a shark expert from Massachusetts said of the photos of seals attacked by sharks. “That is very useful information. We can start to piece together the predatory behavior of white sharks.”

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

NICK WHITNEY AND GREG SKOMAL: Facts, but no easy answers, around shark bites in New England

July 31, 2020 — A terrible tragedy took place in the waters off Maine this past Monday when a woman was fatally injured by a bite from a white shark. As shark scientists, we follow these incidents closely and try to learn whatever we can, but we fully realize that data and analyses are of little comfort to all those affected.

We also know that part of our job as scientists is to communicate the facts to the public as clearly as possible: This was the first-ever shark-related fatality in Maine’s history. There were only two fatalities from sharks in the world in 2019. Globally, shark bites on humans were lower than average in 2018 and 2019, and this trend appears to be continuing in 2020, according to the International Shark Attack File at the Florida Museum of Natural History. Given the number of people who enter the water every year, shark bites are rare (64 bites worldwide in 2019), and the vast majority of people who are bitten survive.

Those are the numbers, but other facts around shark attacks are much more difficult to assess: Why did this specific incident happen? What brought the shark so close to shore? What attracted it to the pair of swimmers? Why did it bite? The reality is that such incidents are so rare that the single biggest factor is probably chance.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe

MASSACHUSETTS: More seals means learning to live with sharks in New England

July 31, 2020 — Seals are thriving off the Northeast coast thanks to decades of protections, and that victory for wildlife has brought a consequence for humans — more encounters with sharks.

Seals are a favorite prey of large sharks such as the great white. The recent death of swimmer Julie Dimperio Holowach, who was killed by a great white off Harpswell, Maine, might have happened because the shark mistook her for a seal, authorities said.

Swimmers off the New England states have learned to be more mindful in recent years due to a spate of sightings of great whites, the apex predator made famous in the movie “Jaws.” A shark that killed a man off Cape Cod in 2018 was also believed to be a great white.

That was the first fatal shark attack in Massachusetts in more than eight decades, while the death of Holowach on Monday was the first documented fatal shark attack in Maine history.

“They’re not vindictive or mad or angry or preferring human flesh. They just occasionally make a mistake. And it’s tragic when they do,” said Greg Skomal, a shark specialist with the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries. “As we restore top predators, the potential for these interactions could increase.”

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the New Bedford Standard-Times

Great white sharks have returned to New England

July 30, 2020 — Maine saw its first fatal shark attack in the state’s history Monday when a shark killed a 63-year-old New York woman off Bailey Island, Maine, northeast of Portland.

“Based on the information I have from the state of Maine, including photos of tooth fragments, this was definitely caused by a white shark attack,” says Greg Skomal, a leading Atlantic great white shark expert and senior scientist with the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries. Maine officials invited Skomal to consult on the investigation into the attack.

The return of great white sharks to New England over the past two decades is both a conservation success story and an emerging public safety concern. Though it is extremely rare for a shark to attack—much less kill—a human, incidents are on the rise in New England. Since 2012, there have been five attacks in the region, all in Massachusetts. Only two have been fatal: Monday’s, and the death of a boogie boarder off Cape Cod in 2018. Before 2012, the most recent attack occurred in 1936. (Read about how Cape Cod has grappled with becoming a great white shark hotspot.)

It’s not known precisely how many great white sharks are in New England waters, but a tagging program Skomal started in 2009 suggests the number is growing steadily. Data from a five-year population study he launched in 2014 is still being processed, but he tagged a record-breaking 50 white sharks off Cape Cod in 2019.

Read the full story at National Geographic