A 16 foot great white breaches the surface, cutting a California seal in half. Blood swirls as the predator swallows the first, then the second half before disappearing beneath the water. 3 days later, on August 11, 2009 at Stinson Beach, a mile south of the seal attack, 4 more white sharks are sighted only 200 yards from this California shore. Witness photograph the sharks with cell phones.
On August 30, across the globe in Glentana Bay, South Africa, a surfer dies after a savage attack – the shark takes his leg– yum, yum, another statistic!
In the Pacific, tiger sharks attack swimmers off Kawa Kau beaches in Hawaii. There are three victims.
Along the US east coast, 5 great white sharks are tagged by researchers in what is called an
unprecedented amount of shark sightings near Chatham, Cape Cod. And on November 13, a fellow boating close to shore off Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina, photographs a 16 foot white shark with his cell phone.
In my home state of Florida, record numbers of sharks – tigers, bulls, lemons, great hammerheads and blacktips are being hooked and beached by sports fishermen from Daytona to Key West and in the Gulf coast to the Florida Panhandle and into Texas waters. And, not little five-footers, but ‘biguns.’ Some up to 14 feet long, 1000 pounds or more. South of us, during March of this year, hoards of bull sharks invaded the southern coast of Costa Rica. Government officials demand something must be done!
Now amid all these verifiable, undeniable newspaper, TV films, photographs, hospital reports and reliable witnesses, why do environmental groups like Wild Aid, Safe Shark and a slew of eco-idiots continue to push the disappearing shark theory and related propaganda across the world? PROFIT and POWER: profit from their eco-businesses (send money to save the X) and an intoxicating power to persuade and control the public.
On every environmental website you’ll see the slogan “one hundred million sharks killed each year!” Really? This slogan of theirs means jobs and money. “Going green” equals folding cash! It’s eco-business and big bucks to pander to the doom-and-gloom theory. They feed on drama and crisis like sharks feed on each other. Meanwhile destroying both commercial and recreational fishing with their propaganda films that tug at unsuspecting hearts and wallets. “Send us your money, we need to save the sharks!” While they stage photos of dead sharks, fins cut off, lying on the sea floor. I’m not saying this never happens, just not to the extent they say it does. And hey, commercially fishing for sharks near shore, or recreational fishing for a few of them is not the same as those lunatics that cut the fins off somewhere in the deep sea. That’s like saying someone who snaps a twig from a tree is deforesting a nation.
Now let’s address their supposed shark net problem: They film porpoise tangled in the nets off Durbin, South Africa where 17 million dollars are spent annually to use and maintain these nets to protect millions of tourists from shark attacks. This is a staged performance, utilizing an already dead animal. Sea mammals have exceptional sonar detection and wouldn’t simply “get caught” in a net. I used to capture bottle-nosed dolphins for the Miami Seaquarium and those buggas are smart! It took three boats to chase the dolphin into the nets; many times they’d simply jump over it. Environmental photographs are often staged, convincing the ignorant of their follies. Thankfully, in Durbin, their government recognized that human death is bad business so the enviro-nuts aren’t able to shut down the beach netting that keeps tourists safe. And if sharks are nearing extinction, why have the catch totals from these nets been increasing over the last four years? Maybe the eco-nuts want these nets shut down because they prove their theories false! Some government officials believe that the eco-tours to watch great whites feed while divers photograph them from cages is causing the sharks to lose their natural fear of man – another reason they are coming closer to shore.
Tampa 2002: Environmentalist groups The National Audubon Society, Earth Justice and Ocean Conservatory took donated money and sued NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric) and NMFS (National Marine Fisheries Service) to add leverage for their causes, resulting in even more regulations, more regulations!!! And now, these government agencies are only too happy to comply.
Mote Marine Laboratory, working with The Florida Fish Wildlife Conservation Commission, is flexing their power muscle as well; Executive Director of the Southern Offshore Fishing Association, Bob Spaeth, knows how all their fishing restrictions can kill the commercial fishing industry, as does Sean Paxton, who represents The International Shark Fishing Association. Even William Fundora’s group – The South Florida Shark Club, is affected. And all these fishermen will be facing new restrictions in 2010. Lee Schlesinger of The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission claims too many sharks are dying, speaking from the state that leads the world in shark attacks! And Delray Beach City Commissioners passed a law that prohibits anglers from fishing for sharks along the shore as of July 2009. Who’s dinner bell are they ringing?
We need to face the truth here: sharks’ only natural predator is Man. Because of all this rampant protection and pocket-lining, sharks are growing in numbers off our shores and vital fishing industries are being decimated. Hey you with the tugged at hearstrings: look past the staged photos and films, look past the brainwashing propaganda, realize you’re being had, and search for the truth – it’s really about power and greed, not about conservation. Shouldn’t it be about protecting the public, not saving a predator?
