Large Shark catch and kill order WA.

harmonix1234

harmonix1234

Eats Squid
BM Epic said:
Im still interested to find out the original question of why all of a sudden these great white attacks are occurring, im not going to start arguments about little details etc, but the original question was why these attacks all of a sudden started?
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Could it be that there is less fish in the Ocean?

It could be lots of things.

A few years back there was an unusually warm winter/spring in the Antarctic region and thousnads and thousands of seals and penguins couldn't get their normal feed of fish and so they persihed on the beaches and rocks, and didn't breed.
Lots less seals and penguins also means lots less shark food close to home.

Another thing is, a mate of mine who is head skipper for huon aquaculture (Huon Salmon) says that they have noticed a lot of seals from right up the North of Tassie that usually live up there year round are moving down here to the Derwent river (about 300kms south of their usual home) to come and eat the salmon in the nets and breed down here because it's a reliable source of food.
Clever little buggers. They are now permanent residents, which also means that the sharks up in the bass Straight aren;t getting access to their usual seal tucka.

Huon Salmon have tagged and relocated a few dozen of them back up to the North of the state to their normal home turf and within a few weeks they are back.
In 30 years of salmon farming this is something he has only seen happen in the last two or three years.

Just recently, they had a big hole in the net that the seals had created and the diver went down to patch it up and there was a juvenile great white in there also having at the free salmon. They had to catch him and release him elsewhere as well.
First time they have ever had a GW in the nets. This was only last week.

I guess the salmon attracts all kinds of stuff and is always going to be a magnet to hungry predators, but the fact that this new behaviour in seals and first noted, and first 'reported' GW sighting in the nets makes me wonder how much is coincidence, how much is clever seals taking 30 years to work out how to get a free feed and pass that knowldege of food spots down to their pups, and how much is behavioural changes across the top end of the marine ecosystem due to overfishing?
 
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D

D2R

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So why has this recent spate of attacks occurred? Many suggestions are being thrown around. One popular theory is that increases in seal populations and the number of whales migrating through the region are a major contributing factor. Dead whales floating at sea soon become huge burley balls, attracting sharks from far and wide. Recently a baby whale carcass washed ashore in South West WA during a large Winter swell; it’s now sitting 10m high of the high tide mark near Torpedo Rocks, half way between the popular Yallingup and Smiths beach surf breaks. Due to its inaccessible location the authorities have decided to leave the whale to decompose naturally - something Yallingup surfers find a little hard to swallow.

Despite anecdotal reports from local surfers and fisherman of a strong increase in shark numbers coming close in shore in recent years, Dr Rory McAuley, a shark research scientist with the W.A fisheries Department, believes ‘an increase in numbers was possible, but not yet proven’.

What studies have shown is an increase in the number of shark attacks. According to records kept by Taronga Park Zoo in Sydney, 194 people have been killed by sharks in Australia over the past 200 years – an average of about one each year. Western Australia alone has seen four fatal attacks and three other near-fatal encounters in the past 18 months, and a more recent study published by the CSIRO found the number of shark attacks in Australia had risen from an average of 6.5 incidents per year in the decade 1990-2000 to 15 incidents per year in the past decade.

Dr Rory McAuley suggests the higher number of attacks could simply be due to the human population expanding. Not only is it getting larger, it's getting more dispersed, so people are getting into the water over a greater area of the shark's range. With this we are more likely to see an increase in shark sightings and attacks."
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Read more: http://www.coastalwatch.com/news/article.aspx?articleId=9660#ixzz2hGgG6QWC
 
A

al_

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pharmaboy said:
Did you miss the bit about families and kids?


Either way, it perfectly illustrates how someone who actually lives there empathises with they local reaction while those with absolutely nothing to lose in this equation, shout from the other side of the country from the safety of their land locked properties .
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So we need to kill sharks because there is a perceived danger for kids and families wanting to go for a swim?

I have family all along the coast from Perth to Margaret River, including a surfer cousin that gets out daily. Sharks are part of the landscape. It is easy to give yourself absolute immunity from being eaten - just choose not to enter their habitat. The tiny risk doesn't stop any of us, including his young daughter, getting out there.

I love sharks and do everything I can to see them in the wild. The people I see that fear sharks generally have nothing to do with the ocean and have ignorantly allowed themselves to develop irrational and misplaced anxieties. The dangers are so tiny for the majority of recreational swimmers that they really aren't worth discussing. The risk of drowning, being caught in a rip, hit by a surfer, run over by a boat etc are infinitely higher, but those dangers don't have big teeth or a genre of films dedicated to them.
 
rb baby

rb baby

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moorey said:
Fuck, I hate this mentality.... Cull the sharks, because they potentially impact on my occasional recreational fun and saves me a few dollars on buying a luxury food. :tsk:
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Moorey, my mentality about saving a buck on luxury food is sarcasm hence the twice in 9 yrs qoute, surely you of all can read that.

I will stand my ground and say that culling off a few larger sharks ifs fine, or that there will hopefully be some patrols around the beaches down that way to help make these swimming places especially now its SCHOOL HOLIDAYS a bit safer.

Think whatever you like but its a bit different for Westies along our undeveloped coastline.
Would you take your kids to the beach and not let them go for a swim?
And if you did let them swim wouldnt you prefer while yes its at yours and there own risk that possibly that big fuck off great white that they caught last week wont be eating one of your most prized possesions?

BTW I dont have kids but i still believe in trying to make things a little safer, in my family and social circle we are in the water young diving for abs its a way of life, Esperance is beautiful but like any waters its dangerous there is nothing wrong with trying to control the risks somewhat.
 
PINT of Stella. mate!

PINT of Stella. mate!

Many, many Scotches
rb baby said:
Think whatever you like but its a bit different for Westies along our undeveloped coastline.
Would you take your kids to the beach and not let them go for a swim?
And if you did let them swim wouldnt you prefer while yes its at yours and there own risk that possibly that big fuck off great white that they caught last week wont be eating one of your most prized possesions?
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If I was that concerned about them being munched I'd take them to a water park. They've got flumes and slides and no rips or fish-poo.

Being able to swim in the ocean is not an inalienable right. You don't hear of people in the NT or FNQ screaming for massive culls on crocs and box jellyfish just because they can't go for a dip! Nobody around Fraser Island has ever seriously suggested wiping out all the sharks around there just to appease the tourist industry. Snakes are bloody everywhere in this country. Should we kill every snake too just in case little timmy wants to go play in the long grass?

This "Won't somebody think of the children" bollocks has gone too far. Sharks are not 'Pedos of the sea!'

(that would be dolphins).
 
johnny

johnny

I'll tells ya!
Staff member
rb baby said:
Moorey, my mentality about saving a buck on luxury food is sarcasm hence the twice in 9 yrs qoute, surely you of all can read that.

I will stand my ground and say that culling off a few larger sharks ifs fine, or that there will hopefully be some patrols around the beaches down that way to help make these swimming places especially now its SCHOOL HOLIDAYS a bit safer.

Think whatever you like but its a bit different for Westies along our undeveloped coastline.
Would you take your kids to the beach and not let them go for a swim?
And if you did let them swim wouldnt you prefer while yes its at yours and there own risk that possibly that big fuck off great white that they caught last week wont be eating one of your most prized possesions?

BTW I dont have kids but i still believe in trying to make things a little safer, in my family and social circle we are in the water young diving for abs its a way of life, Esperance is beautiful but like any waters its dangerous there is nothing wrong with trying to control the riskhat.
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If there has been a spike in attacks over the last few years do you really think that killing off a few here and there will actually change the equation? Sounds like a bandaid that won't actually do anything other than kill some wildlife.

Also a bit arrogant to say "I want my kids to swim how I want them to swim and will kill whatever is stopping them from doing that". Is swimming at the beach that important?what about some other solutions such as nets, tidal pools or swimming inland at waterfalls and rivers?accepting that you cannot have somethings exactly as you want them is a sign of maturity.
 
A

Aussie_Ryder

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PINT of Stella said:
If I was that concerned about them being munched I'd take them to a water park. They've got flumes and slides and no rips or fish-poo.

Being able to swim in the ocean is not an inalienable right. You don't hear of people in the NT or FNQ screaming for massive culls on crocs and box jellyfish just because they can't go for a dip! Nobody around Fraser Island has ever seriously suggested wiping out all the sharks around there just to appease the tourist industry. Snakes are bloody everywhere in this country. Should we kill every snake too just in case little timmy wants to go play in the long grass?

This "Won't somebody think of the children" bollocks has gone too far. Sharks are not 'Pedos of the sea!'

(that would be dolphins).
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Thank you for bringing clarity to this thread Pint. The ignorance from RB Baby is beyond belief it almost seems like an obvious troll.
 
BM Epic

BM Epic

Eats Squid
harmonix1234 said:
Could it be that there is less fish in the Ocean?

It could be lots of things.

A few years back there was an unusually warm winter/spring in the Antarctic region and thousnads and thousands of seals and penguins couldn't get their normal feed of fish and so they persihed on the beaches and rocks, and didn't breed.
Lots less seals and penguins also means lots less shark food close to home.

Another thing is, a mate of mine who is head skipper for huon aquaculture (Huon Salmon) says that they have noticed a lot of seals from right up the North of Tassie that usually live up there year round are moving down here to the Derwent river (about 300kms south of their usual home) to come and eat the salmon in the nets and breed down here because it's a reliable source of food.
Clever little buggers. They are now permanent residents, which also means that the sharks up in the bass Straight aren;t getting access to their usual seal tucka.

Huon Salmon have tagged and relocated a few dozen of them back up to the North of the state to their normal home turf and within a few weeks they are back.
In 30 years of salmon farming this is something he has only seen happen in the last two or three years.

Just recently, they had a big hole in the net that the seals had created and the diver went down to patch it up and there was a juvenile great white in there also having at the free salmon. They had to catch him and release him elsewhere as well.
First time they have ever had a GW in the nets. This was only last week.

I guess the salmon attracts all kinds of stuff and is always going to be a magnet to hungry predators, but the fact that this new behaviour in seals and first noted, and first 'reported' GW sighting in the nets makes me wonder how much is coincidence, how much is clever seals taking 30 years to work out how to get a free feed and pass that knowldege of food spots down to their pups, and how much is behavioural changes across the top end of the marine ecosystem due to overfishing?
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Thanks so much for that harmonix, it is food for thought, the seals looking for the easy feed, i suppose we would if faced with the same choice??
 
BM Epic

BM Epic

Eats Squid
PINT of Stella said:
Despite Great Whites being found in almost every ocean around the world and a general increase in recreational water use, it seems that WA is the only place where the attacks happen.

I can only surmise that it's because God hates people who wear fucking Hi-Viz everywhere they go!
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I gotta laugh at that, i went into the city of sydney on friday to attend a creditors meeting, boy did i feel out of place wearing nice casual clothes, would have felt much better in Hi Viz, as it was i felt very much in a minority group!
 
Bermshot

Bermshot

Banned
You won't be able to buy your veggies without yr hi-vis soon. Don't go on a dolphin watch cruz without Hi-vis, you might get pecked in the eye.
 
moorey

moorey

call me Mia
rb baby said:
Think whatever you like but its a bit different for Westies along our undeveloped coastline.
Would you take your kids to the beach and not let them go for a swim?
And if you did let them swim wouldnt you prefer while yes its at yours and there own risk that possibly that big fuck off great white that they caught last week wont be eating one of your most prized possesions?

BTW I dont have kids but i still believe in trying to make things a little safer, in my family and social circle we are in the water young diving for abs its a way of life, Esperance is beautiful but like any waters its dangerous there is nothing wrong with trying to control the risks somewhat.
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I just fundamentally disagree with your method of controlling the risks. Simple as that.
 
Dozer

Dozer

Heavy machinery.
Staff member
Let's say a cull goes ahead along the west coast and we read that one hundred good sized sharks have been extinguished. Bang! Two days later we see a story of a person being bitten and either dies or his hurt very bad. What then? What will be the next call to make? You'd have to be pretty special in the head to suggest killing more sharks...............

I surf and I have seen some big ocean animals in the water. I've caught waves with dolphins, I've had big fish swim under me and I've had some funky stuff rub against me in the water but I still get in and I still know the risk. If I was to be bitten would I want to see a gang of bearded old jerks with beanies and woolen jumpers head out and kill every fish in the hope of making a name for themselves? Hell no, no way at all. In my eyes, fishing sucks altogether and is a pretty shitty way to spend your spare time. Some have babbled to me about the thrill of catching a big fish, even a shark and all I've felt like doing is kicking their head off it's socket. These fuckers then have the stones to say sharks should be killed for chowing down on red meat............... der.
 
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