Sharks of Bimini

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Sharks of Bimini

Few animals in the world can stir the kind of emotional response that sharks can. Whether it be fear, excitement, terror or awe, the sheer mention of these ocean predators incites a reaction from everyone.

Through movies and sensational news reports, generations of people have been taught that sharks are mindless, vicious killers. But is there any truth to these kind of statements, or do they just help boost ratings? Are sharks really out to get us?

There are over 450 different species of sharks in the world, and only about 20 of those pose any threat to people. Each year an average of 5-10 people are killed by sharks world-wide, with another 50-70 receiving non-fatal bites, usually to the hand or foot. To put that in perspective, in the U.S. alone dogs usually kill between 30-40 people every year, and bite more than 10,000. Across the globe, coconuts falling from trees actually kill more people every year than sharks do.

As top predators, sharks play a key role in the in the balance of every ocean ecosystem, and influence the health of everything from fish populations to corals. As a simple rule, the more sharks you have in an area, the healthier the ecosystem, and vice versa. And as far as being mindless fish, that is also far from the truth. Sharks have been shown to learned trained behaviors up to 80 times faster than domestic cats.

Shark populations in the Atlantic have declined between 70-95% over the last 30 years, and while sport-fishing had little to do with that collapse, the continuous hunting of sharks is now playing an ever-increasing threat to the health of the oceans.

Rather than a monster to be feared, sharks should be respected as the kings of the ocean, keeping our planet’s largest ecosystem healthy and reminding us that we are, indeed, just part of the food- chain.