Real talk for a second, the sharks we share our dive sites
with need our help. Each year roughly
100 million sharks around the globe are killed via a process called
finning. That is to say, commercial
fishermen catch sharks and saw off their fins (I mean all of their fins, tail,
dorsal, lateral, pretty much anything that sticks out off of the animal’s
otherwise sleek body). Then, said
fishermen boot these still alive newly made amputees back into the ocean. Now, I don’t know if any of you have ever
tried to swim without using your arms or legs but it is not what one might
describe as easy. In fact, swimming after
the removal of all of their fins proves impossible to the poor creatures and
they sink to the bottom where they are eaten alive by scavengers. That’s a pretty messed up way to go, isn’t
it? I mean it’s the kind of thing one
might see if they made an undersea version of the Saw films.
It is exactly that kind of imagery that might prompt a
thoughtful sort of person to exclaim, “Why aren’t these people being
arrested?!?!?!” (and if you are a Simpsons fan you might follow that up with a “*SOB*
Won’t someone think of the children… I mean sharks!!!”) It’s a good question with an unfortunate
answer. Shark finning isn’t illegal, or
even regulated, the world round. Even in
the places where it is regulated, the legislation isn’t enough. In fact, the regulations imposed by
organizations like the EU are full of loopholes and the Convention on
International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES) regulations only cover Whale
Sharks, Great Whites, and Basking Sharks.
I mean they are awesome species but not the only fish in the sea, if you
will excuse the bad pun. Especially when
anywhere between a fifth and third of all shark species are threatened with
extinction.
So there might be a few among you who might ask, “Okay, I
mean sharks are cool and all but is it really a problem if we cut back on the population
a bit?” It is to this person among us
that I say, yes. It is a problem of colossal
proportions. See, the oceans are an ecosystem,
like the rainforests or the deserts, and ecosystems are really just a web of
interactions between living things and their environment. All of the life in these ecosystems rely on
one another to create a balance that allows them all to thrive. Sharks play a crucial role in marine
ecosystems as they are what is known as an apex predator, i.e. they are the top
predator. They keep populations of their
prey animals healthy by thinning the herds (or in this case schools) which
prevents overexpansion of prey populations (which would cause the whole school
to starve) and weeds out the sick and weak prey so that they don’t reproduce
and make sick and weak offspring. Furthermore,
we aren’t just cutting back shark populations a bit. We are killing them off in the tens of
millions, much much more than their reproductive rates can keep up with. Bottom line is the oceans need sharks.
Okay so shark finning sucks.
And Patriot Scuba in conjunction with Project Aware is trying to put an
end to this kind of douche baggery. That
is why throughout the month of November we will be running our own
Finathon. This is an event aimed at
raising money to lobby worldwide for stricter and more comprehensive regulations
on fishing for shark and consequently stop finning. It works like this, throughout the month you
can raise money for the cause by getting your friends, family, coworkers,
random strangers to donate based on the distance you swim or walk through the
water. Then send us that cash either
through our CrowdRise page (http://www.crowdrise.com/
Still not sure where to start? Patriot is hosting a Finathon event on
Sunday, November 11th at George Washington Rec Center from 10am to
1pm. We are hoping to collectively swim
30 miles (the distance from the shop to the Rappahannock Quarry) and raise at
least $300 (the sale price of a pound of shark fins) to donate to the cause. So come out, show your support, and help us
put an end to this truly disgusting practice.
For more information about Shark Finning check out the
following links:
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