Can We Equate Sharks with Land-based Predators?

[drrich2]

Hi:

This question has been percolating in my mind for some time. It comes up in different genres of threads, including these:

1.) Shark feeding dives via chumming. The concern is that desensitizing sharks to being around humans, and/or conditioning them to associate us with food, increases the amount of human & shark close encounters.

2.) Shark feeding dives via spear fishing near sharks.

3.) Cageless shark diving with tiger sharks, oceanic white-tips and even great white sharks.

4.) 'Shark Riding' - where people grasp a shark by the dorsal fin & are pulled among, with the poster child being a female conservationist free-diving and riding a large great white.

5.) Discussion of how to respond if a large shark of a species known to've slain humans comes on the scene; you're doing some other hand of dive & a large tiger shark, great white or really large bull shark cruises into the area.

Someone may attempt to characterize the dangerousness of such encounters by comparing them to land-based predator encounters. Most regard getting to within, oh, say, 20 feet of a wild bear (black or grizzly) as idiotic, nor would most of us willingly get that close to a wild mountain lion, African lion, Bengal tiger, Nile crocodile (in the water), etc...

Yet many people dive around potentially deadly sharks without harm. The argument that we don't look like their natural prey also holds true for bears, mountain lions & some land-based predators. Yet is seems to be different. If I had to choose between floating out in the middle of the water 20 feet from a 14 foot salt-water crocodile, or scuba diving at 30 feet deep 20 feet from a passing 14 foot tiger shark, I'd be frightened either way, but for some reason I think I'd pick the shark. (In fairness, Abernathy dives with Emma the 14 footer, whereas Steve Irwin used to work with salt-water croc.s, and it seemed like Agro and the rest wanted to kill him).

So why is it different?

What ocean predators would frighten you the way the land-based or croc.s would? Great white? An orca? Giant squid? Beyond simple fear, are there any you consider comparably likely to attack?

Richard.

P.S.: It's not just sharks. I've been near big barracuda who doubtless could've taken my hand off, in high-viz. conditions, and admired them but wasn't all that scared.

 

[divad]

Yes; Sharks = Cats.

 

[cb5150]

The scariest land based predator I ever encountered was this red head I used to date in college. She reminds me a lot of sharks, in that she often appeared calm and laid back, but you just KNEW there was a hurricane brewing underneath. She could go from Zero to Feeding Frenzy in the blink of an eye...much like a shark.

....Hmmm, maybe that's why I like sharks so much.

 

[divad]

Yes, people and flesh eating bacteria are tied for 1st.

 

[drrich2]

If sharks were like cats, I'd demand a cage. Even then, they'd stick their paws through the bars and claw at me.

It's telling that while people have a large range of sizes of dogs, from chihuahuas to great danes, very few people dare to keep a really large cat (e.g.: pet mountain lion, although there are those who do).

Richard.

 

[Tigerman]

Im not nearly as worried about bears, wolves or lynx as I am about moose. Predators is hard to scare into attacking you, moose is just bloody unpredictable...
Now polar bears on the other hand you netter be damn careful with..

 

[Kharon]

Sharks are predators at or near the top of the food chain. Feeding them conditions them to associate divers with food same as feeding bears, wolves, alligators, or other predators. It also destroys their innate fear of divers. All in all a bad idea, especially for the spear diver in water where sharks are fed, but also for the diver/snorkeler who has no food to offer.

Shark riding is just plain wrong!

As far as fear, I'd rather face down a black bear than a bull shark - the blacks are cowards. I'd rather not be be in the water with a big tiger, white, or bull. I definitely don't want to be anywhere near a big (or small) salty. If I knew I was going anywhere near a lion, moose, bengal, or any such I'd at least have a 50 cal revolver. If I was diving in water where there were known to be whites or bulls, especially where an attack had occured I'd have a bang stick - though I doubt I would entertain such a dive.

The salt water predator that scares me the most though is the Red Devil. All that said, I usually dive where sharks are not fed, on reefs where they are absent or small, and if I get eaten - well, I'm 67 and I'm good with the idea that my time is approaching.

 

[Wingy]

I dont know that sharks actively predate divers - they seem to be generally disdainful of our bubbles and metal and not really that interested in us at all..just my personal experience. I have dived with big sharks of species generally considered the baddies of the bunch but the one sea predator that really at some gut level was just disgustingly wrong to be in the water with was a salt water croc, a juvenile, but still a crocodile a couple of m long. I dont agree with or dive where baited/fed/cage diving is done - it conditions sharks not to be wary of us.

I might be entirely wrong..I might get eaten tommorow.

I cant really make a call on land predators...i live in Australia, the worst that can happen is I get the sh*t kicked out of me by a kangaroo.

 

[danvolker]

Hi:

This question has been percolating in my mind for some time. It comes up in different genres of threads, including these:

1.) Shark feeding dives via chumming. The concern is that desensitizing sharks to being around humans, and/or conditioning them to associate us with food, increases the amount of human & shark close encounters.

2.) Shark feeding dives via spear fishing near sharks.

3.) Cageless shark diving with tiger sharks, oceanic white-tips and even great white sharks.

4.) 'Shark Riding' - where people grasp a shark by the dorsal fin & are pulled among, with the poster child being a female conservationist free-diving and riding a large great white.

5.) Discussion of how to respond if a large shark of a species known to've slain humans comes on the scene; you're doing some other hand of dive & a large tiger shark, great white or really large bull shark cruises into the area.

Someone may attempt to characterize the dangerousness of such encounters by comparing them to land-based predator encounters. Most regard getting to within, oh, say, 20 feet of a wild bear (black or grizzly) as idiotic, nor would most of us willingly get that close to a wild mountain lion, African lion, Bengal tiger, Nile crocodile (in the water), etc...

Yet many people dive around potentially deadly sharks without harm. The argument that we don't look like their natural prey also holds true for bears, mountain lions & some land-based predators. Yet is seems to be different. If I had to choose between floating out in the middle of the water 20 feet from a 14 foot salt-water crocodile, or scuba diving at 30 feet deep 20 feet from a passing 14 foot tiger shark, I'd be frightened either way, but for some reason I think I'd pick the shark. (In fairness, Abernathy dives with Emma the 14 footer, whereas Steve Irwin used to work with salt-water croc.s, and it seemed like Agro and the rest wanted to kill him).

So why is it different?

What ocean predators would frighten you the way the land-based or croc.s would? Great white? An orca? Giant squid? Beyond simple fear, are there any you consider comparably likely to attack?

Richard.

P.S.: It's not just sharks. I've been near big barracuda who doubtless could've taken my hand off, in high-viz. conditions, and admired them but wasn't all that scared.

A big distinction I would make between chumming and hand feeding..... For tens of millions of years, sharks were constantly exposed to Natural death events, such as whale carcass, etc...bringing many sharks, grouper, and other predators to dine on the "natural death based feeding event". When you see groupers showing up at a whale carcass, you see the sharks ignoring them.....All each of the predators attending will care about, is getting their share of the carcass.
Chumming( the blood trail)... is the "invitation" that has been used for the same tens of millions of years.... If you chum, but there is no food to be found, this is ALSO a result sharks have faced for tens of millions of years....that they showed up too late, and the buffet is over....In fact, we know that this is really their expectation when following a blood trail where there is no vibration or sound related to a death struggle--the shark knows instinctively, that the struggle is long since over--and that there may very well be nothing to find....so the shark swims slowly, they don't get all excited--they try to conserve energy on this hunt....but they do follow the trail, on the hope that something may turn up....

And when this is Chumming like Abernethy does...when the shark gets there, they look around, wondering if they are going to see a buffet meal anywhere--but they don't....so they look as long as they feel the INVITATION is still going out....up until at some point, they decide there is nothing, and they go elsewhere.


The Hand feeding or spearfishing issue is very different--at least to me.....when Frank Hammett taught me advanced spearfishing techniques in the early 80's, one of the big lessons he shared with me--that was a RULE followed by all the spear fisherman of the day ( 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's) -- was that if you bring sharks in by spearing a fish--you get the fish out of the water AND YOU DO NOT LET THE SHARK GET FED.....No one wanted sharks to figure that WE would represent an easy meal.....They knew sharks were OPPORTUNISTIC, and just like Jewfish, if they thought it would be easy to STEAL a MEAL, rather than hunt a healthy fish down--THEY WOULD STEAL THE MEAL. This was obvious to the old time spear fisherman...and it is obvious to many of us today.

The old timers knew that if sharks began figuring the DIVER=FISH TO STEAL, then sharks would soon be "looking and digging in our pockets" for food so to speak...like a horse looking for an apple.....Except, unlike a horse, the shark will bite through the person when looking for the apple



As to the shark riding.....Remoras do it.....Sharks don't care much, or they would do something about it.....an 18 foot long GWS is NOT in need of sympathy from environmental liberals that think the poor helpless shark needs to be protected from the evil snorkeler. Sharks have very obvious body postures they use to express themselves when they feel it necessary---THREAT Displays are common, as are territorial posturings with the pectorals tucked and the rapid torquing of their body left and right....if the snorkeler was bothering them--the snorkeler would quickly get the message...or become a protein snack.


As to the terrestrial predators and how they respond to people....comparing bears and lions to sharks.....I think this is faulty on a direct basis, because the lions or bears would see humans as prey....the sharks typically assume we are another predator--maybe a lower level predator that must be subservient to themselves--but still another predator....

With land based predators....there are several species that exist in their environments with other predators that they evolved with--possibly not competing with for the same prey--but evolved at a level as a co-predator....and are KNOWN to be predators, not Prey..... A couple of wolves will not look at a Grizzly Bear in the same way they would look at a lamb or a sheep.....The bear will not look at the wolves like it looks at the sheep. Each is looking for prey that fall in to a specific trophic level that it hunts in....Each is going to avoid predators it deems as potentially dangerous--that could limit it's ability to pass on it's genetics by injury or death--survival value in evolution.
I'm sure that there are evolutionary biologists, or others specializing in trophic level interactions, that could easily pinpoint the ideal predators to use to discuss this with.... But I am confident, that sharks assume we are not prey, but an unknown predator--or, at worst, as just not food--as is the typical reaction to Lionfish.

 

[DaleC]

It isn't different.
There are places in North America where you can come quite close to grizzly bears Home | Hallo Bay but this is because they are well fed on fish. Like sharks, land based predators measure the cost of acquiring food and most of the time they do not want to risk injury doing so when predictable sources are available. Man is an unknown. That is why sharks occasionally test people with half-hearted mouthings - they are not kissing us. They are seeing what it will cost to commit. To think sharks are incapable of seeing people as food is a great misnomer as the survivors of the Indianapolis discovered. It is just that most of the time the effort is not worth the reward. Usually they have known systems of acquiring food that work more successfully and sharks are very successful at what they do.

Bears, cougars and other land based animals are much the same. Most will avoid contact but any predator, if hungry enough, will consider the risk worth the reward. I am pretty sure that bears do not see people as prey so much as we are unknown predators - we act like predators in our movements. The way we walk, the way we ignore the subtle cues of our environment, the way we make noise, the way we do not stop and listen. All these things are cues to other animals about our perceived safety as a predator. People tend to "own" the space they are in, like predators, while prey is prepared to relinquish space. That's why we tell people not to run from a bear. It quickly translates that we consider ourselves as prey and induces a predator reflex in the bear. Until then, the bear doesn't quite know what to make of us.

Here is a pretty interesting synopsis of some of the factors at play during a bear attack (scroll down to questions and theories) : http://www.yellowstone-bearman.com/Tim_Treadwell.html

On land there is a longer history of dealing with this issue so the notion of acclimating predators to people by providing them food from our hands is no longer endorsed. But, as we see in many ways, the ocean is a vast unregulated arena.
One thing that goes to the heart of this is why we dive in the first place. Some people have a naturalist/ecological bent and are willing to spend a lot of time in the water and let things unfold as they will. Most of the time, the ocean moves along at a pretty pedestrian pace. Others seek "watercooler" moments and only dive occasionally, so they need to provoke a memorable event on command. In some ways it is not meeting the ocean on the oceans terms but rather, manipulating it to meet our timetable.