Why do we need to Save the Sharks? What will actually happen to you if we kill them all and there are none left in the sea? Will you even notice?
These pictures were taken at a fish market in Lombok, Indonesia. One of thousands in just this one country. The people responsible for these dead sharks are just every day, local people. They aren't very well off. They aren't trying to cause environmental devastation. They're just normal people, trying to make a living under a system that does not recognise unsustainable human behaviour as dangerous. If you aren't from an area where this sort of thing regularly happens, they might not feel very relevant to you. But it is happening. And the knock-on effects are relevant to you. They're relevant to all of us.
Controlling Other Species' Populations - Why does it matter?
Perhaps the best known example of this is the total collapse of the 100 year old sustainable scallop fishing industry along the Atlantic Coast of the USA. This study from scientists at Dalhousie University - https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/03/070329145922.htm - found direct links between overfishing of large shark species and population booms of their prey, including the Cow Nosed Ray. The knock-on effect of this is perhaps obvious, more rays means less of whatever rays eat. Rays eat scallops. These rays ate all the scallops. So the communities depending on this industry found themselves in deep trouble and the price of scallops sky-rocketed for the rest of us. Perhaps less obvious, is where it goes from there. Rays uprooting scallops from seagrass beds causes damage to the seagrass beds - this habitat is essential for the breeding and initial life phase of many species. Without healthy seagrass, these species can't maintain their populations, causing their predators to either go hungry or find something else to eat. It's like when you rip a teeny hole in your tights - soon it's a massive ladder that just keeps on running and your tights become pretty useless. Tights may not be essential to human life. But oceans are.
Scallops are also suspension feeding bivalves - they filter water and have a measurable positive effect on its quality - https://www.nap.edu/read/12802/chapter/9 - They protect shallow waters by removing inorganic particles and phytoplankton from the water column. This buffers the effects of eutrophication, clarifies the water and transfers nutrient rich particulates to the bottom where they can be used to support seagrass beds and other habitats that form essential nurseries for thousands of species.
Without networks like these working in harmony, fundamental changes to the ocean ecosystem start to affect the movement and retention of carbon within the sea - all living things contain carbon and the sea has absorbed more than half of all carbon emissions since the industrial revolution ( http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/07/0715_040715_oceancarbon.html ) - it can take a lot. But upsetting the complex network of the ocean ecosystem beyond a certain point leads, in the words of Marine Conservationist Professor Steve Oakley, to something "hot, sour and empty".
Scallops are also suspension feeding bivalves - they filter water and have a measurable positive effect on its quality - https://www.nap.edu/read/12802/chapter/9 - They protect shallow waters by removing inorganic particles and phytoplankton from the water column. This buffers the effects of eutrophication, clarifies the water and transfers nutrient rich particulates to the bottom where they can be used to support seagrass beds and other habitats that form essential nurseries for thousands of species.
Without networks like these working in harmony, fundamental changes to the ocean ecosystem start to affect the movement and retention of carbon within the sea - all living things contain carbon and the sea has absorbed more than half of all carbon emissions since the industrial revolution ( http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/07/0715_040715_oceancarbon.html ) - it can take a lot. But upsetting the complex network of the ocean ecosystem beyond a certain point leads, in the words of Marine Conservationist Professor Steve Oakley, to something "hot, sour and empty".
Do you:
- Work in the fishing industry?
- Have family or friends who work in the fishing industry?
- Like to eat any sort of fish or shellfish?
- Eat ice cream, or cheese?
- Enjoy being able to look out of glass windows?
- Drink out of glasses?
- Wear glasses?
- Use toothpaste, shower gel, moisturiser, shampoo?
- Not want to eliminate our best defence against Global Warming?
- Breath oxygen?
If you answered yes to any of the above, you will 100% notice if sharks disappear.
Dead sharks for sale at Tanjung Luar Fish Market, Lombok
Sharks are the Apex Predator of an ecosystem spanning 2/3s of the surface area of Earth. Their role as Apex Predator serves to keep this system in balance. And I'm not talking Chi. I'm talking critical to balancing an ecosystem that provides 3 billion humans with their livelihood - http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/oceans/ - An ecosystem that produces more of the oxygen we breath than all of the rainforests put together. An ecosystem that removes half of all our CO2 emmissions, providing the best defence we currently have against Global Warming - http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/07/0715_040715_oceancarbon.html - An ecosystem that helps regulate the temperature and weather of our planet, stopping it from getting so extreme it kills us.
Sound unlikely? Terrifyingly, that's all true. Sharks are crucial to life for the human race as we know it. But how can they possibly play such a huge role?
Sound unlikely? Terrifyingly, that's all true. Sharks are crucial to life for the human race as we know it. But how can they possibly play such a huge role?
The main ways in which sharks have been shown to regulate their ecosystem and why they are referred to as a Keystone Species - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keystone_species - are: 1. Controlling population numbers and quality of their prey species - http://www.fmap.ca/ramweb/papers-total/Myers_etal_2007_Science.pdf -. 2. Causing tropic cascades by modifying prey behaviour patterns
Hot sour and empty can't sustain the 3 billion humans currently dependent on the world's marine ecosystems for their livelihood. What will they do? Where will they go? Will we wonder why we batted an eyelid at the current refugee crisis once the dead zone in the middle of the Bay of Bengal starts to cause displacement of the 200 million people dependent on that area? - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jan/31/bay-bengal-depleted-fish-stocks-pollution-climate-change-migration
Taking out sharks isn't the only cause of all this. We are. With our thoughtless lack of regard for, and normalisation of, the harm we cause in our everyday lives. And the way our societies are hardwired to prioritise financial growth above all else.
But one way to speed things up so that you'll get to see global devastation yourself and it won't just be something your children will have to face after you're gone, is to get rid of the apex predator of the most biodiverse ecosystem with the biggest impact on climate and weather on the planet.