‘Shark’: it’s an
evocative and symbolic single syllable. Just the sound of the word conjures up
a host of associated images, usually to do with menacing fins, teeth, and a
certain cinematic soundtrack. #SharkWeek
ramps up the public awareness around sharks, but it’s also a chance to
reconsider and revalue these iconic, and undoubtedly
awesome, ocean creatures.
Sharks have been around on earth much longer than us, and
play vital roles in keeping oceans healthy. There are lots of kinds of sharks,
from tiny tiddlers, to
whale-sized giants,
but the most iconic sharks we think of are the true wanderers and travellers of
the oceans. Species like hammerheads, great whites, blue sharks and reef sharks
roam the oceans in search of food and mates. They don’t understand or recognise
political boundaries, and they don’t necessarily know the trouble they are
swimming into.
For there’s no mistaking it – sharks have more to fear from
humans than humans have to fear from them. But we kill sharks directly and
indirectly through indiscriminate and over fishing. At the same time we are
fundamentally changing ecosystems through pollution, development, and
extracting minerals. Then on top of that Climate Change is altering our oceans’
basic chemistry. So put yourself in a shark’s place for a change. How do we
lessen our impact? And how do we help species that roam across seas, and travel
over entire oceans?
The answer is simple, yet geopolitically complicated. We
need to give sharks sanctuary. Ocean sanctuaries, marine reserves off
limits to damaging human activities create areas for sharks to find refuge, respite and a chance of recovery.
To work for sharks that move around a lot, they need to be big. That means
prioritising areas that are important for sharks to feed and breed. A first
step would be to protect sharky equivalents of motorway service stations, or singles bars: places where sharks already congregate, like seamounts, or
so-called ‘shark
cafes’. But to give sharks an even better chance we also need to protect areas important for migration.
It’s already known that ocean critters like sharks and turtles have some
migration ‘highways’
across the ocean. More work is taking place to
tag and track sharks to get a better understanding of these routes, but to
protect them will need international cooperation.
The sharks that roam the open ocean are most
endangered, with a third of them now threatened
with extinction, and some species having declined by over 95% in the past
few decades. Yet on the high seas, areas outside national boundaries, there is
no real mechanism to protect or enforce areas. So once a shark (or turtle,
whale, tuna, whatever) swims out into the high seas, it’s open season. That’s
one of the reasons we are working to change the way the world protects its
oceans. When it comes to ocean sanctuaries for these ocean nomads, bigger
really is better. The High Seas cover about 65% of the ocean, and only by
working together can we make sure they, and the sharks and other amazing
creatures that depend on them, get the scale of protection they need.
This Shark Week you can help us give the sharks a break, by joining
the call for ocean sanctuaries.
Then dive into Shark Week and enjoy the Jawsomeness.