Wow.. that's a big increase in the number of drum lines. 

Well its about time some action was taken..

Great white filmed yesterday enjoying a paddle in knee deep water just off the beach at Lennox Head.
http://www.northernstar.com.au/news/watch-three-metre-great-white-shark-...

How many ''relocated ''sharks are coming back to where they were originally caught?

Yeah I think it's highly likely they'll swim back towards shore where there's likely to be more food.. I think a decent solution, and potential compromise between people with different opinions, might be to do a mass tagging of the white pointers, and set up alarms at a handful of popular beaches. It could be partially funded by an app that you could pay a yearly subscription for, and at least see if there's been many great whites in the region, what times of day they've been close to shore. You could combine this with drone surveillance at a handful of spots. Funding could also be partially met through one of the universities - I'm sure data from the movement of these sharks would be of interest to someone doing a PhD.

ie it alarms if they come within 100metres of the beach

Wont work because you cant tag em all,impossible.The one you dont tag will be the one that hammers someone.How could you possibly tag every white?I think bring in the nets and drum lines that seem to work in other places and speed up development of a shark deterrent that everyone can use that works,must be something out there that will do it.
Cant believe the state and federal govs havent been on to this.

As the majority of the Northern NSW coastal communities seem to be against shark nets, this seems a good alternative.

I thought a drum line generally killed a shark as it's a baited hook? But this says catching for relocation...

Pretty good middle ground if you ask me. Also means more data working towards a better understanding.
There are some interesting ideas going around about the acoustic and satellite tags- acoustic tags being that they transmit at 69mhz which is middle hearing for seals, whales and dolphins. Have a bad year hunting seals down south- picture a bell around a cats neck and who knows... you might have more luck on the north coast....
Anyway more food for thought its a definite artifact in the study and any scientist who i have asked about it gives a prettt flimsy argument back. Seems all ideas are catch 22.

Um, so let me see how this works. You get down to your fave stretch before dawn, check your phone and see that there isn't a tag for 5km and the one that shows up is having a snooze so you think you can safely paddle out.

Three possible scenarios then eventuate.
A) you have a great surf and all is well.
B) the tagged schnoozer wakes up and heads in your direction but is happy with just a leg today - your phone cant warn you because you are in the ocean
C) a non tagged bastard swims up and says Gday mate - your phone doesn't help even if you took it out in the ocean with you.

Cull the buggers and A) can be more reliably depended on.

I don't understand all the tree hugging idiots on here. Perhaps we could put a collar and leash on the buggers and take them for a walk out 2 km offshore giving us say 20 mins surftime before they return?

It will be packed here the next swell coming this week. Already loads of guys from Evans and Brunswick have been coming up here the past 12 months.

Hey Disco, what's your definition of cull?

Do you have an issue with smart drum lines?

Yeah. Just cull them. Howd that go in WA? Zero catch. Waste of money.

tried to post this three times now, nt sure what is going on.

It seems that drums line work, but they work better when the sharks are killed, not tagged and released:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-12-23/shark-attacks-smart-drum-lines-fac...

So the drum lines are effective of catching sharks for relocation. The tagging program at least will help know what sort of numbers there possibly could be in the area.

What happens next I see the drumlins and tagging as a means of research but stopping sharks entering the shore zone is a little more difficult.

I'd really like to see some accurate and concise statistics put together over sightings, taggings, receiver pings and the like. Presented to the public and the media in a no BS form
IMO is there is a clear anomaly in the Ballina to Evans area, and the following whale theory don't cut it.

Culling in WA started right at the end of the "shark season".

Drum line and kill them in the popular areas (ie Ballina) to remove the imminent threat.

Do the research to get an understanding of what they are all about.

Find other alternatives to work with or replacing drum lining.

Cant understand why they dont bring these guys in.
http://www.ocearch.org/#Home

Last summer the government gave notice to business owners in the shoalhaven that because of the sharks up north family's were heading south in fear of the attacks. This long weekend there isn't a campsite,cabin or motel available from woolongong to batemans bay. It is chockers.

It's a tough situation for sure, super sad for anyone attacked, as well as the ramifications for a community as a whole...

But how can relocating an animal 'further out to sea' achieve anything meaningful when they can easily swim back to that same beach on a whim? It doesn't make sense. They not only migrate up and down the coastline of Aus as a part of their life-cycle, but regularly cross entire oceans. What is the Gov going to do? Drop them off in Peruvian waters?

I'm also interested to know what sort survival rates these guys are expecting? Are they using J hooks? Circle hooks? What's their response time?

If the protection of human life is the number one goal here, then why don't we put up non-lethal shark nets around a few strategic beaches, and those on this thread who are so hell-bent on 100% safety can go surf there. Or better yet, build them some Kelly Slater wave pools. Meanwhile, the rest of us who are willing to take responsibility for our own actions of entering the water can surf (and potentially meet a shark) anywhere else in the Ocean.

It has never been a risk-free activity - and it shouldn't be.

Does anyone know if this whale has been dug up as planned?

http://www.northernstar.com.au/news/school-to-study-skeleton-of-washed-u...

And, if so, when?

On the road, they are using massive circle hooks, and I think so far the survival rate looks to be 100%.

They had the gear used on display at the last community meeting here at Lennox.

Humpback washed up locally 2 weeks ago. You can see the poor thing got it's tail caught in a cast off fishing net and no doubt died of exhaustion.

Anyway, the main supervisor said they were going to bury it where it lay and I told them that was a dangerous and stupid idea based on what's going on back home. And in the typical Japanese way he turned his head, refused to acknowledge me, stared straight out to sea and didn't utter another word signalling that this conversation is over.

Surprised they didn't want to conduct any research?

Hypocrites.

Speaking of hypocrites, Zen, the surfing community paints this holier than thou "environmental" image... You see it in advertising... It's in our roots.... But how times have changed..... Some fat non surfing pig screaming about money, and the surfing community lining up to support drum lines instead of education about not surfing when the bait fish are running or whales are around..... But this is the reality of drum lines.....
Dont worry, there's heaps of dolphins.... It's just friendly fire, colateral damage.. The show must go on....

And while I'm at it, you pin heads drinking your maccas thick shakes and tossing your crap out instead of binning it, this is the end result of your disgusting behaviour...

That's hideous

No doubt there is some bycatch on the drum-lines Sheepdog, but I've no doubt that predation from whites on the local dolphin population would dwarf any impact of smart drum-lines on dolphins.
I would be incredibly surprised if a smart drum line ever killed a dolphin.

Also, if we didn't surf here when there were baitfish in the water or when there were whales in the vicinity you'd get about 10 days a year in the water. Thats just not a practical suggestion.

By the way is anyone keeping track of the DPI SharkSmart app?
go on twitter.
It's hard to keep up with but it looks like at least 2 more white sharks tagged from the smart drumlines in the last 2days.
Many more sightings and acoustic detections from the listening station buoys. These are all official DPI confirmed, hard data.

I'd really like to hear one of the shark scientists come on and explain this abundance of juvenile/sub adult whites and not recognise that the population is rebounding. They're going to have to use the fairy godmother to explain it.

Another article on ABC. Not a view I agree with but here's the greens take on the smart drum lines

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-03/nsw-government-taking-wrong-approa...

When are we going to address the motor vehicle problem?! Over 300 people died in NSW alone in 2015 in motor vehicle accidents. We've gotta get these things off the roads!!!
There is no significant change in shark attacks over time! Looking at the period 1840-1850 (selected randomly) there were 5 fatal shark attacks in NSW all around Sydney (except 1 near Newcastle). This despite the fact that there were only 400k people in all of Australia and NO surfers!!!
Compare that to 2005-2015 when there also 5 fatal attacks in NSW but with a population of 7.5million!
Face it there is a risk in surfing but it is negligible compared with driving yet very few people are suggesting we stop using motor vehicles

Hey T-Diddy, that is just the most bogus argument ever. You do realise that, right?

The road toll used to be far higher. Then we introduced mandatory seatbelt wearing, and random breath testing etc etc.

Yes, it's high and appalling but we try and do something about it.

You get that, right.

The rates of attacks are increasing, and in some areas like Ballina, they are soaring off the charts.
So, by your reckoning, because more people die in car accidents we should do nothing.

Thats just not very bright, or even good logic.

Tagging..hahaha. In the country that just had a massive fail trying to run it's census online, looses power to an entire state when its windy, and has a national comms provider that regulary has it's mobile network down for the day. Dreaming. Wouldn't work anyway. I had a mate who was tagged and all he needed to do was put on two pairs of socks and he was off down the pub.

Freeride, given that most affected are surfers, what is the preferred way the local surfers suggested to manage this ? (Assuming there was one).
Good to see an effort is now being done.

Freeride76 - "The rates of attacks are increasing, and in some areas like Ballina, they are soaring off the charts."

Compared to what? Compared to when? Compared to what length of time?

Freeride are you suggesting that there's huge numbers GWS just in northern NSW (an unusual concentration? ) or are you suggesting there are huge numbers all around Aus? Just curious, if your interested....

Hard to say Rabbitts, there's definitely an aggregation happening in NENSW, but take a look at the tracking maps for the tagged sharks and you'll get an idea of the distribution and movement.

http://www.wildlifetracking.org/?project_id=1141

Was looking at that tracking data the other day and it looks like the Sharks are now starting to head south, with the whales. Crazy how many of them though hang out around Ballina.
Other interesting thing is the number that stop transmitting, not sure if that is equipment failure or mortality

Not too many adult pointers on that tagged sharks list.

The Ballina factor. Hard to imagine that the rivermouth is not playing a significant part.

Another interesting observation is that the reports of high whale numbers & increased seal populations in the area (based on input from these forums), be they transient in nature, poses the question, why would the GWS come in so close so often if their abundant preferred food scource is passing by much further off the coast? I'm mean, how many whales/seals are regularly cruising through the back of the lineup in that region? Something else, possibly a combination of several factors, is drawing the GWS in that close so regularly IMO.

Attack happened when it was 21 degrees again. My theory they like this temp. (On the far north east coast) Cool water pocket is because of Cape Byron and the East Aust Current going downhill so to speak.

Aust Salmon are a factor Rabbit68 since closure of cannery and pressure off the species they are now going all the way to QLD waters rarely got above Sydney. Whites love the salmon. You will also see in the tracks Freeride put the link up for the tagged sharks, they hunt the snapper in the first part of the year pre whale migration. This will be around far sth coast of NSW and Tassy and SA.

Yes Purple the GWS do seem to enjoy the salmon run. Same in SW WA, although that's been happening (salmon runs) for a long time over here without incident until pretty recently. Clearly the GWS aren't coming in close to specifically feed on humans otherwise they're going pretty hungry. Also if they've always been around in close, why just recently are they attacking humans? Purely putting it down to a greater population size doesn't quite add up when other significant factors are also taken into account.....

Salmon is a fine theory except for the fact we haven't seen a single salmon north of the Clarence for a few years now.

Few years ago there were football field sized schools of salmon here in far north NSW, but they haven't been here for a long time.

scroll down ,quite a few of the boys around today.....wonder if its like this everywhere seeing this is only the patrolled spots.

https://twitter.com/NSWSharkSmart

Salmon one factor of several, still get good fish runs in May (mullet,tailor,bream ect...)

The humpback went from 500>10k pop. size. I believe the white was never endangered nor the grey nurse. I'm in croc country ATM and boy 'o boy they need a cull.

I am going to get the popcorn out and wait and see what hard data they pull out of 100 drum lines, the figures for 15 are impressive.

On a side note how the hell are they going to relocate big sharks via what method? Anyone know?

On the whale thing, someone already asked why are the GWS hanging around in close in certain areas, if the whales are travelling say 1 to 5 km out (roughly). Some of the tagged GWS also appear to be moving north, against the migration.
Further, the bulk of the GWS seen/tagged appear to be juveniles - at least by the so called experts, which are said not to not prey on mammals until they mature.
There's a phd (and a fat govt grant) for the new totem animal in this somewhere.

exactly Toots, lots of evidence here going against the prevailing theories

As purple has observed, crocs are in plague proportions but there is no desire from authorities to cull, so wouldn't hold our collective breaths waiting for govts to do the obvious, sensible thing with GWS. The answer, IMO, is education. Let's teach the drum-line-captured GWS that it's impolite to attack humans and that they should take responsibility for their actions (the defence of a difficult upbringing or cultural differences notwithstanding).
PS The same principle is being applied to African gangs in Vicco and we can all see how successful that program has been.

I reckon that's how the shark nets work.

Obviously not an impermeable barrier in themselves, the odd unlucky shark that is caught sends a pretty strong signal to other sharks that there is something heinous afoot and they remain relatively scarce.

Another variation on the #sharklivesmatter movement currently running hot amongst a resurgent Pointer population.

Kill one , display the carcass and the rest don't want a bar of the joint

I've seen a lot of comments on social media that over fishing is the cause or one of the causes of the issue

That's not logical to me. I would think that if an area is over fished then the sharks would swim off to find food elsewhere or would die out.

overfished areas should have less sharks

Is my logic righ?

Overfishing is just the standard ignorant urban green response.

There's been a significant reduction in commercial fishing effort along the NSW coast.
Ballina used to have 36 trawlers working out of there. There are now 6 and that number is expected to reduce to 3.
The rebound in inshore biomass, in conjunction with marine parks has been noticeable.
So, no lack of food to bring predators in.

Yes, in the big picture alot of the world's fisheries are over-fished. Australia has been pretty good at managing fisheries and our inshore fisheries are in the process of rebounding.
So the problem is not over-fishing.

Crocodile Management in the northern territory is interesting.

They insist it isn't a cull but they maintain exclusion and no tolerance zones.
Ie a croc in Darwin Harbour is caught and killed.

Read it for yourself.

https://nt.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/202578/crocodile-managemen...

Regarding over fishing, there's no question that our fisheries are managed heavily and are generally in good nick. But what about the improvements in efficiency over time? A night of trawling today is far more effective than a night of trawling 30 years ago. The east coast fisheries aren't effort controlled fisheries are they? Improvements in gear type can increase standardised effort despite a decline in trawler numbers.

I know 36 down to 6 is a huge decline but how long ago were there 36 trawlers? And did those missing 30 boats move to Yamba or have they stopped fishing the region altogether?

I agree it's most likely unrelated to the attacks but it might be more complex than a decline in local trawler numbers.

Freeride, you might have said it already but do you have a theory? You're seriously in touch with the fish assemblages there. I had thought the rebound in whale numbers has probably helped increase the shark population (along with protection of the sharks), but there's so many ideas floating around that I'm doubting everything I'm thinking.

So, if the following things aren't related to this GWS issue, over-fishing (in fact an ignorant theory apparently), higher numbers of whales & seals, river mouths, salmon & other fish runs, ocean temps, ocean changes, more people utilising the ocean, cage diving plus any other theory that's been dismissed by a few "people in the know" (in these forums), then what is the issue/s? Is it simply a greater increase in the GWS population? The big whole in that theory is why weren't humans getting attacked regularly back in the day when the GWS population was healthy or at least at the current levels? Are some of you suggesting that the GWS population is currently at an unprecedented high?

How about instead of just confidently dismissing theories, actually confidently provide the reasons why the the GWS are hanging in close?

Like anything on a forum the post below is my personal opinion - so read on with caution!

It is certainly evident that there is a high relative abundance of great white sharks between Newcastle and the north coast of NSW (and probably into Qld). Relative to the last 20 or 30 years of everyone's surfing/fishing lives, give or take a bit depending upon our age! The big question is why?

The sharks are hanging around for a reason, and being spotted more often. So let's split this up into: 1. Why would the sharks be hanging around? and 2: Why would we be seeing and interacting (including attacks) with more of them?

1. Some possible reasons for the sharks hanging around are (including theories from this forum):
- there are favourable abiotic conditions (water temps, currents, turbidity/clarity, rivermouth etc) for them to inhabit the area
- there is food there for them (fish, seals, whales etc depending upon their preferences)
- they do not have to compete as readily for food i.e. with other sharks/species
- they are not threatened by bigger white sharks in close who could eat them

And why would we be seeing/interacting with them more often? Some reasons include:
- there are more people looking (DPI tagging, aerial surveillance, smartbuoys etc)
- there are more surfers/fishers/spearos/kayakers in and around the water more often (weekdays etc)
- the human population of the area has increased over time
- the sharks are more active in searched areas due to moon phases/water clarity/food availability/they prefer the shallow inshore area for some reason
- there are more absolute numbers of sharks

It's most likely a combination a number of factors listed above and not any one reason would be the decider. Given how complex this is, it makes it really hard to understand/predict/manage/control, especially since the attacks have happened close to shore and outside of the typical dawn/dusk bite period which is so ingrained in our minds. Like other wild populations not any one individual will be predictable, but the more you know about a species the more you can identify general trends in their behaviour and manage for those trends. Sometimes the trends get blown completely out of the water, like in and around Ballina.

What would trigger an increase in the population of white sharks? Protection certainly would, especially if a species has been reduced to levels in need of conservation. White sharks have been protected for >20 years, and given they are slow growing and slow at reproducing it would take some time for them to rebuild their population - but after 20 years and with favourable conditions, this is very possible. A few years back there were reports of surfers and fishermen spotting juvenile whites in the surf at Stockton Beach near Newcastle, and the NSW DPI/CSIRO scientists tagged a bunch of small whites ( <2m) in the surf zone around Stockton and up to Forster, with Port Stephens being theorised as suitable juvenile habitat for them. With their slow growth rates there is every chance that some of these sharks are the same ones that are now ~2.5-3.5m and living in this similar area. CSIRO shark scientists have said that around this size (2.5-3.5m) some white sharks change their food preference from eating fish to small mammals (seals, dolphins) and potentially baby whales. This may explain why surfers are being attacked in the areas where the sharks have been spotted as they have been mistaken for a small mammal prey item.

As for managing the interactions - the only way to avoid an attack is to not go in the water. As this is not possible for most of us as surfers/spearos, its about being smart with where and when you surf. If there is a report of a shark being sighted in an area (remembering that they have the ability to swim 10s to 100s of km a day), then not surfing that day is an option to prevent an attack. Whether or not you choose this is your decision.

Another way to reduce the chance of attacks is to reduce the number of sharks in an area. There are a number of ways to do this but ethically and morally this is a very difficult and complex situation. Existing shark control programs run with the thought that removing active sharks from areas where humans are also active reduces the chances of an attack. Given that we do not know which shark will attack or when, this takes out sharks that might or might not attack, and other animals that interact with the gear. Given that individual shark behaviour is so unpredictable, whether or not a shark control program has a statistically significant effect on reducing shark attacks is very difficult (probably impossible) to prove, and has not yet been proven in Australia. So we do not know whether the shark nets/drumlines are preventing attacks (other than the very qualitative argument that fewer sharks = reduced chance of attack), but some people feel safer knowing that they have some amount of perceived protection rather than none at all, and some governments use this argument to support their decision to use them.

A large reduction in shark numbers (a "cull") would potentially reduce the likelihood of attacks but not completely remove the risk. The questions is, are we ethically or morally justified to decimate an apex predator in its natural environment so we humans can feel safer recreating in the ocean?

Given that lives of fellow surfers, friends and family are on the line every day this is a very emotive issue and unfortunately there is no absolute solution to such a complex problem - people will keep surfing and sharks will keep doing what they do. It's about being aware of the environment you are entering an unfortunately probably forgoing surfs in areas or at times that you would have otherwise have had. What can the government do to protect you? The range of measures that they have adopted (failed barrier trials aside) seem to be giving more information about when, where and how big sharks are active, and awareness in this sort of situation is a good thing. Everyone needs to remember that nowhere in the world has this problem been resolved (including on Reunion Island where surfing and swimming have been completely banned!), so every measure that is adopted is experimental.

Let's hope that the shark attacks reduce over time for everyone's sake.

Andrew P
That has got to be the most measured, thought out, considered post on here.

Blowin: 'Display one carcass and the rest don't won't want a bar of the joint'. This never worked on foxes do you think it will work with sharks?

Morally and ethically? what a moron you are Andrew. Stay in Sydney where you belong.

good review andrew. some of us though believe the risk of attack is so minimal that it doesnt warrant getting excited about. to suggest that surfers lives are on the line everyday is fanciful to be honest.

you correctly point out though, a cull will indeed reduce the risk. so instead of several lives lost per year, maybe its only 1. your chances of attack have reduced, but at what cost to the taxpayer?

Nice summation Andy.

I think everything you've said is reasonable except your view that Shark Control Programs aren't proven to work.

There's enough hard evidence from the South African, Qld and Nsw programs to show that reductions in risk of shark attack following introductions of shark mitigation are statistically significant.

Andrew P - you covered a few issues, thanks. I would however suggest that your closing remark "hope that shark attacks reduce over time" is misplaced. The current scientific consensus, given their EPBC Act listing is ' vulnerable', can only be interpreted as meaning there is still substantial rebuild potential in our white shark population. My concern is that we will experience more of these attack clusters over the next 20 years and that they won't be confined to northern NSW.

As a people we seem comfortable "knowing" that many of our endangered terrestrial animals will never return to anything like their original numbers so why is it so unacceptable to suggest that white sharks be managed at a population level which is not at a risk but well below a full recovery.

Out of interest, the following is a ver batim reproduction of an email conversation I had with Dr David Powter, Marine Ecologist from the University of Newcastle.

I think what he says is very measured and reasonable although I tend to disagree with him when he says "the NSW government has responded quite well to a very difficult situation".

He echoes other scientific claims that there is no hard evidence to show that GWS numbers have increased since they were protected.

Q. Do you believe that there are more or less Great White sharks now compared to 20-30 years ago? Is what we’re seeing now the rebound in population since GWS were protected?

A. I am not aware of any solid evidence to suggest that the populations have increased. However, data from the Queensland Shark Safety Program shows a steady, or perhaps slightly decreasing, catch rate over the last 20 years in nets and drumlines, whilst the NSW Shark Meshing (Bather Protection) Program shows a continuous decline in catches in nets since the 1950s and 1960s. Although this doesn’t directly equate to overall population numbers it suggests that the number is lower than, or at best similar to, what it was 20-30 years ago.
White sharks were protected in Australia around 1996, so we are about 20 years post-protection. Given that females reach sexual maturity around 12-17 years of age and have a reproductive cycle which is probably around 3 years, it is unlikely that there has been sufficient time for anything more than a small increase in the population since protection. For example, females born at that time would only have produced one, or at best, two litters since that time and many individuals would not have reached maturity yet. It’s also worth remembering that the threatening processes that lead to their population declines are still operating, although some at lower levels than previously.

Q. It seems to be generally acknowledged that nets are too indiscriminate to be publicly acceptable but what problems do you see with “smart drum lines” which aim to enable tagging of sharks which are then released alive?

A. I agree that nets are too indiscriminate, with the NSW nets having a targeted catch rate of less than 15%, hence more than 85% of their catch is non-targetted (and therefore not dangerous) marine species, including endangered species like the grey nurse shark. Smart drum lines are better than nets for this reason and are also better than traditional drum lines as they allow for the possibility of any captured animals to be released alive. However, their value in protecting beachgoers is questionable as well. Following the spate of attacks on WA a few years ago, the WA government introduced a catch and kill policy using baited drumlines to target white sharks as they were responsible for those attacks. However, the 4 month program captured 172 sharks, of which 68 were shot, but none were white sharks – the targeted species. The ‘benefit’ of smart drumlines is that they allow sharks to be tagged and released and the data that can be collected from this is critical if we are to better understand shark population statuses, movements, etc, which is necessary to inform future policy and management responses. Before making any decision on their value, it would be good to see the outcomes of the current trial deployments.
The other issue concerning nets is that they do not represent a complete barrier, as many people believe, as they are often about 150 m long and sit 4-6m below the water’s surface. Additionally, nets in NSW are deployed off parts of the beach used by swimmers and patrolled by life savers and the like. Surfers, who have been the victims of the North Coast attacks, do not use these parts of the beach. Hence, nets potentially offer them absolutely no protection.

Q. Do you feel that it should be up to governments to protect the public in this situation? What are your thoughts on ocean-users exercising personal responsibility eg. Purchasing shark repellants?

A. I believe there is a responsibility both ways. Firstly, governments are charged with the care, management and protection of the public, which means they cannot fail to consider addressing issues that represent a threat to people, local/regional economies, etc. However, governments should exercise thess roles and responsibilities in an evidence-based manner – not simply responding or acting in a way that means they are seen to be acting. I feel the WA response and that suggested by the Qld Premier falls into the latter category. I feel that the NSW government has responded quite well to a very difficult situation and has not jumped into deploying damaging and, I believe, ineffectual nets.
I also feel that water users need to exercise personal responsibility and also an acceptance of the inherent risks of the activities they participate in. Like any pursuit, people should be aware of the risks, take any reasonable actions to minimise or prevent those risks and then decide whether they are prepared to take those risks or not. No matter what we do, or governments for that matter, the potential for a shark attack will always exist.
Whilst I don’t want to diminish the tragedy and strong emotions associated with a shark attack, it is necessary to put this risk into perspective. More people drown on Australian beaches in one year than are killed by sharks in several decades.

Q. Do you feel that Shark Smart Apps and similar as well as the use of drones would be sufficient? Would you like to see any other shark control measures trialed or implemented?

A. I think that those measures and the others being trialled following the NSW Shark Summit are worthwhile. Until recently, the response to shark attacks was to catch and kill or use outdated, and questionably, useful approaches such as nets. The NSW government’s approach now is to do something to minimise the risk, such as drones and the app, whilst also adopting an evidence-based approach to evaluating the efficacy of a range of different protective strategies and technologies. However, I think the one area that is still significantly under-utilised is that of public education. There is still a great deal of irrational fear, myth and misunderstanding in relation to sharks, shark attacks and protective strategies (especially nets). Allowing the public to understand these issues better through education programs would allow them to be far more informed and better able to engage in discussions and to evaluate the value of various approaches.

Some very interesting points of view in that convo AndyM.

"It’s also worth remembering that the threatening processes that lead to their population declines are still operating, although some at lower levels than previously."

Also, the point about assessing the inherent risk of any activity we choose to pursue & the statistical facts in regards to human fatalities from shark attack v drowning in the ocean.

Yeah Rabbits, I thought it was worth putting into the conversation.

Way too much hysteria and misinformation getting around, as evidenced by some of the input over at the Nick Carroll-moderated discussion on Coastalwatch.

And as you say, the whole personal responsibility vs government protection discussion is something that has yet to be fully played out.

I've got no real problem with smart drumlines but at the same time I'm not freaked out about sharks.

As I've always said, be more afraid driving your car.

That was a good Q&A, AndyM. I tend to agree that the government has done a fair job considering. The local surfers preferred nets but the target rate looks low.
Given that we surf some incredible slabs, reefs and waves that would crush a three story building, then so be it.
Let's face it, the government will aim for the flagged areas as part of its 'responsibility'.

Cheers Tones.

I'm confident that after having the blowtorch applied to them over the Econet debacle, the N.S.W. government and the D.P.I. will be a bit more responsive to public opinion.

As David Powter alluded to, the refusal to consider nets seems to point to this - from what I understand, most surfers seem to realise that the days of nets are gone.

I agree with your thoughts AndyM. Unfortunately the shark attack debate IMO is often singled out as a "special case" when it comes to what's an acceptable risk of death. Some people don't like to compare the risk of shark fatality v any other routine daily tasks that have statistically way higher risks of death, seemingly turning a blind eye to these facts.

Im also open to most methods of "risk reduction" but like your convo stated, no matter what is done to reduce the risks, there will never be 100% guarantee of not being killed by a shark when one recreates in the ocean. There never has been.

Lots of outdated and unscientific opinions there particularly the last para about education.
The official government advice which is supposed to be educating people is clearly crap and needs to be junked and rebooted.

I also think that basic biological facts about the white shark are very poorly understood by science and hence their conclusions should be seen as highly provisional.

He's not Aware of any hard evidence?

Is he not aware of the current tagging and surveillance programs?
Is he not monitoring the DPI's own shark smart app?

You really do have to wonder what this guy is being paid to do when he seems so clueless.

Freeride -

"Lots of outdated and unscientific opinions there particularly the last para about education"

Not sure what you mean here - are you talking about David Powter or the government itself (two separate entities)? If you're talking about the government I agree.

And I think you can clearly tell by the language he's using that Powter would be the first to agree that he's not putting out any definitive answers regarding the GWS.

Also I think ideologically he's quite a way from Daniel Bucher.

He's saying that tagging, surveillance and apps do not amount to hard evidence.

Too many variables, as a scientist he's going to want more than that.

How is tagging and the subsequent tracking and notifications from the 4g listening stations not evidence?
That's exactly the kind of hard data that's been missing from the conversation.

As a scientist for him not to even acknowledge it is staggering. Does he even know it's happening?

The Great White Recovery Plan is 20 years old this year. No Risk Assessment was done for that document. When we protect 'man eater' sharks whats the first thing we think of? Humans. This was avoided quietly for some strange reason, DOC avoided..

"In tort law, a duty of care is a legal obligation, which is imposed on an individual requiring adherence to a standard of reasonable care while performing any acts that could foreseeably harm others"

The GW was listed in 96' and in 2000' 4 young men were killed by Great Whites in 58 days running here. This was the the time to ring the alarm bell and warn people.

http://s1126.photobucket.com/user/DPIMangledHumanNo658/media/Shark-VicHi...

The point is, how can relatively short term and localised data of the type you're talking about be used as hard, conclusive scientific evidence?

The answer is that it clearly can't, at least not yet.

You can't pillory these guys for not wanting to give out half-baked evidence.

Big difference between supposition (which could easily be correct) and facts supported by sufficient scientific-backed proof.

Im afraid the hard evidence is the fact that 56 2-3 meter whites have been tagged, with most of them tagged between Byron and Evans head in 12 months,not to mention all the ones tagged around the Stockton to Port Stephens area.The scientists have no idea how many white sharks there are, how often they breed or how many pups they have or even how long they live for,so how can it be said they are probably on the decline?

I'll try and put up a longer response later.

I think we are going to see a lot of marine scientists scrambling and trying to cover their arse and instead of using data to falsify clearly incorrect theories doubling down on the accepted myths.
That's fine, it's the way science has always worked.

Cheers Freeride.

Simba - Everything you say may be totally correct but it still does not offer sufficient evidence for a scientist to definitively say that populations are increasing. I'm not a scientist but I think you are underestimating the amount of info required before anyone will make an absolute statement.

Personally, due to existing evidence I believe numbers are increasing but this is scientifically irrelevant. There is clearly not enough scientific evidence to make the call.

I'm not being smart when I say that if you don't accept this, get in contact with a handful of professors, doctors and the like from top universities and research centres and ask them why the info you are talking about is not (yet) scientifically valid.

Seriously.

Damned if they do, damned if they don't Freeride.

Scientists interested in great whites generally say first, we know so little.
Most knowledge is from tagging and limited dissection. It's all guesswork from there. For example, I don't think white sharks have ever been observed in the act of procreation or giving birth. They are highly mobile, they are not people-friendly, they do not cope with captivity and they are virtually impossible to follow and obverve for sustained periods.

Cant understand the hypocrisy of having shark nets in Sydney and Newcastle and the Gold Coast but making endless excuses for not having them around Ballina /Lennox /Evans areas,so really if they are that bad they shouldn't have them any where.

Freeride, with respect, you're overreaching in your criticism here. For starters, proper interpretation of data needs to be measured. It also needs to consider all available information and contexts. I know you know that and I'm not trying to be condescending but you seem to be ignoring the basis for and context of Powter's remarks. He's specifically not saying there's not been an increase, just that there is no solid evidence for it. That's not arse covering, that's interpreting all (or most) of the data carefully and drawing a conclusion.

His comments on hard evidence for increasing numbers of the population refer to 20 years of catch data from Queensland and 60 years of catch data from NSW. You're referring to a tagging program that seems to have been operating for just over 12 months, around Ballina. None of those sources of data are in and of themselves reliable indicators of population abundance, but long term trends can't be ignored either.

Also a tagging program doesn't provide any basis for a stock assessment (population size estimate). It tracks movements but without any kind of comparative CPUE info or long term data of similar nature, it doesn't give you a basis for an estimate of population size.

Lastly, we know Whites migrate thousands of kms, so if you're considering population sizes, the sharks tagged at Ballina represent a blip on the species distribution. Andy didn't ask about numbers in Ballina (or even northern NSW), he just asked about numbers generally, so it's reasonable that Powter didn't respond about the local context only.

To be clear, I'm not dismissing the possibility that numbers have increased and neither is Powter. They may well have. I'm suggesting that it's quite reasonable, given the data he cited, to suggest that there's no solid evidence that they have increased, as he said. Doesn't mean they haven't, just means he can't be sure they have given the information he has available, even if it did included the recent tagging effort.

The data to make that statement might exist (not being a marine ecologist I'm not up on what's out there) but it would have to be so qualified that most people would probably bristle at the caveats it would likely entail. But that isn't arse covering, it's being clear about the uncertainties in estimation.

http://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/comment-how-on-earth-did-sharks-...

Kind of connected to lenny67's point about the lack of a risk assessment undertaken when commencing the conservation program...

Why is a government department responsible for managing natural resources playing the lead role in protecting human safety?
If they maintain the lead role, the result will always be flawed as there is a fundamental conflict, in this case, between conservation and human health, and the DPI will always fall to the conservation side - because that is where their remit is.
They need to be shoved to the side of the decision making process.

A dearth of data should not be an excuse for not taking hard decisions.

If numbers have recovered from a much lower base than exists now, then what is the issue of a targeted cull? This wont reduce numbers back to what they were 15 years ago. Worst case, deaths still occur and some sharks have died in vain, best case, attacks drop and some sharks have died. Seems like a no-brainer.

An analogy:
Kind of like reacting to climate change - complex science with significant unknowns, as well as significant knowns. Even with a lack of data, and significant uncertainty in predictions we still act. In this situation, worst case is that CChange isn't severe as predicted , but we have enhanced our technology base for a minor increase in cost, best case, we make life on earth habitable.

Yeah OK Benski, I probably went a bit too hard there.

Lets keep it more reasonable. We now have solid and ongoing evidence that we have at least local and seasonal abundant white shark populations.
Personally I think it was remiss of Powter not to at least mention the latest data.

Previous theories about white shark populations posited a barrier between west and east coast populations with bass strait the barrier between them. We know now from tracking of tagged sharks that this theory is incorrect.
It's also highly possible that growth rates, fecundity and even age of sexual maturity might have been underestimated or even mistaken by scientists. That has been admitted by chief shark scientist Vic Pedemoors.

In short, one explanation for the seasonal and local abundance of juvenile and sub-adult white sharks is that the population size and rebound has been under-estimated.
I also dispute his statement: "It’s also worth remembering that the threatening processes that lead to their population declines are still operating, although some at lower levels than previously". This is his opinion.
According to Vic Pedemoors white sharks that reach juvenile/sub-adult size have a very low mortality rate and it's more likely that previous threats like commercial and game fishing effort are very much reduced. So I would dispute they are even threatening processes any more.

I'd also very much dispute his reading of the effectiveness of shark mitigation. He cites the effectiveness of the WA drum line program as a mark against drum lines , when it has now been acknowledged that the drum lines were set at the wrong time of year. He fails to acknowledge the incredible effectiveness of the QLD drum lines and now the NSW smart drum lines. The smart drum lines are capturing white sharks as we speak and this data is freely available on the DPI shark smart app.

Is he not aware of this? Or does it not fit his "position" that shark mitigation is ineffective?
No-one can argue with a straight face that the QLD and NSW mitigation programs (and the KwaZulu-Natal shark control) have been incredibly effective at reducing the rates and risk of attack.
To suggest otherwise is the height of intellectual dishonesty.

You can argue on the grounds that the biological impact is too high and that is a legitimate argument. But you can't argue with any credibility that the programs have not and are not effective. The evidence is rock solid and incontrovertible.

Therefore, if govts were tasked with acting according to evidence, as he suggests, then they would employ traditional shark control methods. The current methods being used in Northern NSW are trials. Therefore they do not have the weight of evidence behind them.

Finally, his final plea for more public education is hard to stomach. Does he suggest any of the Ballina attacks might have been avoided by education? Does he suggest that Ballina surfers are not completely aware of the dangers and risks posed?
Does he suggest that Cooper Allen, who was surfing in front of lifeguards, on the first day of school holidays in bright sunshine in the middle of the morning after a very dry month in clear water could have avoided attack by "public education".

I suggest the opposite. I think it's the current crop of scientists tasked with understanding this problem who could use some education. Study the current data. Educate yourself on the patterns of attacks and encounters, and then think about and rewrite the current public education guidelines.
It's scientists who are failing to comprehend reality here, not local surfers.

problem is mcbain, when you consider things like that then everythings a no-brainer. just do it. that might have worked 50 years ago, but issues thesedays are so much more complex and intertwined, including more vested interests. we have a government trying to act in everyones best interest, not just a single group.

i wouldn't get too excited about comparing it with CC. im not seeing the AUS govt jumping into CC solutions too quickly, and the data there has been out for decades ;)

Keep in mind that Powter was only responding to the quite broad questions I put to him - the guy has clearly gone out of his way to answer me so I think it's unfair for him to be criticised for not chasing down every tangent of each question.

GWS numbers/ marine parks -ABC online

Thanks for sharing the Q&A, AndyM. Keep fighting the good fight, freeride. You've nailed it as usual. Dead on target with all your points. You're up against an army of conservationists, though.
There is almost 80 years of empirical evidence that shark nets are effective. Yet scientists and other commentators pass it off and then try to turn the debate to arguments about why the nets shouldn't work (not a complete barrier etc). If they can't explain why it works they can't accept that it does anyway.
Of course there are also many other things to discuss like the probability of an attack, mistaken attacks, tagging and releasing, research, education and personal responsibility. But they are all distractions.
An effective proven solution is available, but some marine life will end up in the nets too.
The conservationists place more value in that bycatch than a human life. If they didn't they wouldn't oppose shark nets.
The government is probably more concerned about the cost of deploying and maintaining the nets. If the Ballina area gets them, Byron and the Tweed will expect it too and then all the other councils along the coast to the south will get in line.
I hope the situation improves there and the drum lines reduce the risks.

got a link for that Udo?

"Culling has been the primary shark mitigation policy of the New South Wales Government for over 60 years, through the use of “shark” nets. But a report by the Department of Primary Industries showed that 24 of the 38 (63%) attacks in the state, between 1937 and 2008, occurred at netted beaches.

Pre-emptively killing sharks is a response based on emotion rather than of scientific data."

The above taken from the other SN shark forum. So those in favour of nets would, I assume, suggest that without the nets the above attack stats would be significantly higher at these netted beaches ? Dare I suggest it, are sharks attracted to netted beaches due to the by-catch dying & dead? Lots of unknowns. Difficult for anyone to talk with any real authority on this broader issue yet. Unfortunately it's going to take time & the implementation/monitoring of ideas along the way.....

Look at the attack rates and fatalities before and after nets Rabbitts.
I'd also suggest the spike in attacks post 2008 would skew those figures.

My skeleton was bent thru the side at 180 degrees. Bitten twice by a 12ft Great White as it drove thru my pelvis and launched me. KO'd at the pelvis. Ive never heard of that but it saved me seeing what was happening till I came up to 20" dorsal. She was pregnant and idle spitting out surfboard. While I screamed it chased me to the beach. About 20 miracles also happened. The pain in the chest on the sand. Oxygen. My children? Flashes. I accidentally paddled into a Federal shark attack cover up.

There's a glimpse of what its like to LIVE thru it and retain all 4 limbs against odds.

Freeride, I'm guessing this is the article to which Udo refers:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-07/more-great-white-sharks-possible-o...

Also, good summary, write up, Freeride.

What stands out to me, is you may just be a lone voice. IMHO, you're on the money. So, what comes to mind is you need weight to your voice. Should we look to have some sort of "surfers voice" behind your thinking? A 'group' with 100 members will have a louder voice than you trying to yell on your own.

????

NSW chief shark scientist Dr Vic Peddemors has stated: "I'm absolutely confident that shark nets have worked."

The CSIRO's top great white shark expert, Dr Barry Bruce, believes shark nets reduced risk in particular areas.

"Shark nets certainly reduce risk because they catch and kill sharks that have the potential to bite people," he said.

"I guess what we don't know — we may never know — is to what extent the overall risk has been reduced by losing that shark.

"From a 'whole of' perspective the answer is probably 'no', but do they reduce risk at the particular areas that they're put in? The answer's probably 'yes', but we don't know by how much.

"Shark meshing and drum line programs only occur in a very minor fraction of Australia's coastline and sadly there are attacks that are spread in all sorts of other areas."

A spokeswoman from the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries said there had been only one fatal attack on a controlled beach since 1962, compared with 20 fatal attacks on the same beaches between 1919 and 1961.

The number of shark attacks in Australia has more than doubled since the 1980s, but figures supplied by the NSW and Queensland governments show large reductions in the number of fatalities on beaches with shark mitigating equipment since it was introduced.

The above statements are an extract from a Four Corners article on the ABC's website. There are alternative points of view in the same article, but the number of fatalities before and after are beyond dispute. Similar before and after figures have been observed in the NSW areas where nets were introduced.

this has been a good read forum. It seems that the surfers need to get louder (somehow) and lobby their local pollie for the preferred solution of nets. Surfers are the group being hit the most in this and it's important to counter act the political correctness going on.
Letters from Le Ba club and also importantly from individuals to the council members and mayor are the first and easy step. Let's face it, government or your local mayor do not give a diddle squat about surfers.

A 2.6m gws shark was caught and tagged in August at Angels beach...recaught today and released 1.2 kms offshore
1.2 kms wtf ..why bother ?

Why don' they use this
http://www.discovery.com/.../shark-repellent-minimyth/
seems like it works

Relocate the tagged sharks??? They will simply swim back in and create an on going risk so whats the point. There has been enough close calls and attacks over the past few years with deaths and some serious lifelong injuries. There are heaps of white sharks in the Ballina/Byron and beyond area and the NSW government continues to play with unproven technologies. How many more attacks will it take before the proven methods of the nearby Gold Coast are extended over the border.

Interesting take on things.

How on earth did sharks become the new dolphin?

Congratulations on pulling off the greatest public relations stunt in history. So would you spare us a few minutes and tell us how you managed to do it? Some of us – sad throwbacks to another era – are a little confused. Like a lot of trends, we kind of missed the moment when it became cool to love sharks.

read more :http://www.watoday.com.au/comment/how-on-earth-did-sharks-become-the-new...

Well they just did an interview on the Today show with an abalone diver Dave Riggs, from south Australia who had an run in with a white recently while diving and filmed it and he was asked the question did he think there was more around these days than before and he said that in his opinion there were a lot more juveniles and his thoughts are that the big breeding females are off the continental shelf where researchers haven't or its simply too hard to do research out there.This goes hand in hand with what Dave Woods,shark fisherman, said on the Coastal watch talk back show on how the theory is the females only give birth to a couple of pups but when he opened up a large female years ago it had 20 or more in it........so do the maths,possible they were never endangered really in the first place and if they were it dosent take long to make a come back which is quite evident now.

The shark thing has been all over the media with even self righteous tools like Peter Fitzsimmons having his two bob.
The hypocrisy is staggering.
Instead of wailing against the north coast doing something, let the twitterati start wailing about REMOVING all shark nets and drum lines in Sydney, Wollongong, Newcastle, and SE Qld.
Don't hold your breath.

"NSWDPI advises there will be no SMART drumlines off Ballina Shire beaches today due to strong winds and very rough seas #sharksmart"

Interesting. I was under the impression the smart drum lines were permanently set out there. This seem to imply they are only set when the weather is calm.
For the record, surf is about 3 feet from the south and there was about 15-20 knots of wind, which has now backed off to about 15knots.
So while it's a bit joggly there's certainly nothing rough about it. The DPI RIB tagging boat could easily get out the bar and do the business if they had to.

They are still catching and tagging sharks like nobodies business on the smart drums and now they have the first recapture, which would seem to mean that as far as deterring sharks from hanging inshore they are as useless as tits on a bull.
Great for giving us hard data but pretty useless at their stated aim of reducing risk of shark attack/encounter.

Sharpes and Clarkes beaches listening stations have been set off every day, multiple times by cruising whites.

It's really quite a reasonable statement to say that this area is loaded with white sharks right now.

Does anyone know what data they are measuring when they tag the sharks?
IE, can they get an accurate estimate of the age of the shark and it's level of sexual maturity?

Surely it's just a poorly worded statement by the DPI and they mean that the drumlines haven't been serviced/baited?

Is it just bullshit OH+S for the DPI?
If so, then there's clearly going to be a lot of downtime for the drumlines.

Reminiscent of the eco shark barriers, where a 2-3ft day and 15 knots is rough.

Cost cutting?
Double time and a half on a Sunday innit?

Ive done some research of my own and here is what I came up with.

There's no doubt the white shark has become both avenging angel and talisman for the green movement.

From a personal point of view Freeride I disagree.

I vote Green and consider myself green but I'm pretty ambivalent about the whole GWS thing.

Apart from nets, I don't care - hook them with drumlines and shoot the big ones, doesn't worry me.

Shoot a couple and let it set an example.

Maybe I'm atypical.

Is it too early?

I don't think your view/stance is atypical at all AndyM.

I personally think Freeride's statement has become the easy catch-cry of those that arn't prepared to except ANY risk from GWS attack when it comes to surfing in the ocean. So easy to blame the Green movement. Have a look around this beautiful planet, who do you reckons winning the battle? The Greens? Your kidding yourself right?

I've also been a long term green voter.

Go look at the comments in any of the mainstream media after an attack. Guardian, SMH, even the Australian.
What you'll see is people lining up to blame the victim and defend the white shark.
I have no doubt a very significant proportion of the public see in the white shark nature fighting back against humanity. In that sense it is a powerful symbol and surfers are collateral damage.
I also have no doubt that for some of these people there is a strange kind of pleasure involved in seeing nature in the form of the white shark taking vengeance on people.

Totally agree Freeride.

And I'd say the majority of these people are actually projecting a virtue signaling love of nature to abrogate against a sub conscious gnawing that they would rather jam a cricket bat in their arse than be exposed to the harsh reality of nature in any meaningful way.

Freeride, just a follow up on your longer post last Friday and this one’s even longer, sorry! Just wanted to note some comments and ideas that are hopefully useful and interesting to people. As I usually do I'm trying to present the scientists perspective, this time trying to cover why they might not make certain definitive statements given the data available on white sharks in Oz. I've tried to use hyperlinks so if it comes out looking messy, I'll edit the post as best I can.

I’ve got no problems with your critique of Powter where his opinion is what he presented (and he clearly did this in places). The main thing I wanted to say is that it’s pretty hard for scientists to make an exact statement about population sizes etc, because it requires a lot of data that we may not have. And in this case, I’d say we may not have sufficient systematically collected data to make the kinds of conclusions you’re asking for.

Scientists are in the position of having a voice that the government pays attention to (sometimes at least), so if they are to make a credible statement they themselves have to as certain as possible about it. Consequently, they will fill things with caveats and use phrases like “appear to be” or “may be”. These aren’t cowardly as people often criticise them for, they’re recognising when and where you can make a definitive statement and when that’s not possible. Obviously, accompanying data collection has to be systematic to be of use in these kinds of questions. Otherwise as has been discussed a lot here, there are so many other processes that might affect the results that it becomes difficult to say definitively why something has occurred.

I’ve not looked through the literature on white sharks much but I’ve had a brief look today and wanted to bring some further thoughts to the table about what evidence exists and how it might influence what people are saying.

So the first thing, about the one or two populations being east and west Australia, blocked by Bass Straight. There’s a possibility there’s a bit of misunderstanding based on language here. A recent paper looking at the genetic structure of white sharks in Oz found two distinct pops, east and west. That doesn’t mean they don’t share the same range, just that they breed separately. There’s evidence of philopatry, where females return to the same region to breed despite ranging elsewhere. That indicates there are two somewhat distinct, reproductively isolated populations in Oz. Again, that’s not to say they don’t share the same range at different times, but just that they don’t interbreed very much. In this case you will find scientists referring to two populations and that very legitimately describes this situation, because that’s exactly what it is genetically. The movement of individuals from east to west could indicate a single ecological population, so I’m not suggesting you’re wrong, just highlighting why some might refer to two populations as well. Basically, both are right it just depends if you’re talking genetically or ecologically. Here’s that paper if you’re interested.

Blower et al

It’s similarly backed by this older paper that confirms the SA-Oz movements indicating natal homing that I can’t find a free copy of. http://science.sciencemag.org/content/310/5745/100
That paper seems to refer to interbreeding among sharks in West Oz and South Africa.

Regarding the underlying trends in abundance, you suggest that it’s possible the pop size and rebound has been underestimated. There’s no question this is possible, no question at all. But there needs to be evidence for that before any scientist will publish that conclusion (or state it definitively) and several inshore interactions in one region is not enough evidence on its own to make that conclusion. Clearly there could be other reasons for these factors, and the first thing I would think of naively is if there are increases in numbers why only around Ballina/northern Rivers, when the species ranges so widely. Why haven’t we seen a similar spate of attacks in Central or Southern NSW and elsewhere un-netted regions we know the species moves through? I’m sure people have thought about that but hopefully you see my point, a broad base of evidence is required to make some definitive statement.

So to look what evidence we do have available; looking at the catch data from the meshing program suggests catch is well down on the levels of the 1950s, but growing since the 1980s.
See Figure 5 here.

They do note in the discussion of that paper that there’s evidence of a decadal cycle of catch numbers too, so it’s hard to make definitive statements of population recovery based on this alone.

Interestingly, they also find that the average size of white sharks caught has become slightly smaller over time (very small difference but an evident change in the length frequency distribution). That might indicate a more successful recovery (i.e. more young’uns out there to be caught) but obviously in and of itself that’s not evidence of that process. It could also indicate the beginnings of a population in decline because as you start to only catch smaller individuals it may mean your breading age adults are declining in number which in the longer term leads to a decline in abundance, despite increases in catch rates in the short term.

A point made in the pop genetics paper (Blower et al) is that there have been substantial changes in gear for the shark netting programs, which of course also confounds the capacity to use these data for abundance estimates. It can be overcome with other data if it were available (it’s a common problem in fisheries stock assessments where fisher’s gear changes over time influencing catch rates along with changes in underlying abundance doing the same), but that isn’t the case here.

That last part is one of the reasons why there’s a general understanding that fisheries catch data isn’t a good indicator of abundance. Clearly the shark meshing catch rates aren’t fishery catch, if anything they’re more systematic, but they are spatially localised so there might be local issues that affect the data and the gear type seems to have changed over time. I didn’t find an analysis of the QLD catch data but it would be useful to compare it.

But on those data alone, and as far as I can tell these are the only quantitative data that could indicate abundance trends, it’s pretty difficult to conclude the population is certainly growing, but there may be some evidence for it.

Regarding the possible underestimation of population vital rates (fecundity, growth rates etc), of course that’s possible. I don’t know much about sharks, as I’ve said but these can be tricky to estimate, especially for hard to study organisms like this. To back up your point there’s a fairly recent paper about how feeding requirements were certainly under-estimated. http://www.nature.com/articles/srep01471

There’s also an interesting paper about feeding that suggests there’s not necessarily the size selective feeding strategies that have been talked about here, but rather that across all size classes, white sharks appear to be generalist feeders. From the abstract “Signature fatty acid profiles suggest that white sharks over the size range examined are generalist predators with fish, elasmobranchs and mammalian blubber all contributing to the diet.” That size range being 1.5-3.9m.
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0097877

So while it’s true there’s been a change in and around Ballina, and those data can’t be ignored, it’s difficult to use them to declare a change in population size, especially when we haven’t seen similar patterns in other regions that we know are within their home range.

I have thought that it would be interesting to analyse inshore shark observation data, where recorded observations (either by surfers, lifesavers, chopper sighting, etc) are analysed in conjunction with attacks/bites. The low frequency of attacks relative to the number of humans in the water makes, statistical analysis very difficult (even allowing for zero-inflated distributions) but if you record all recorded observations of a shark in the surf zone and examine the attacks/bites/bumps as a proportion of the observations, rather than as a proportion of beach users (which is the old more people in the water = more attacks), then you have a dataset that is potentially more feasible to analyse. Would require someone to gather the records of observations from different sources up and down the coast and marry them up with the smaller number of bite/bump interactions. But if local authorities do keep those kinds of records I do think it would offer a way of getting a sense of whether the number of observations has changed over time (and where) and whether that has coincided with a change of bite/bump frequency.

A good quote from that Sprivulis paper:

"No individual in, or on, a surf ski, sea kayak or boat
was injured in this study, suggesting that the use of such craft,
which are substantially larger than surfboards or body
boards, for surf sports offshore can reduce the risk of injury from a white shark bite (Figure 2)"

See you all out there on 12' logs.

Does anyone have figures on longboard attacks, out of interest? I'd say a big fat zero here in Oz from recollection.

Freeride76 "I also have no doubt that for some of these people there is a strange kind of pleasure involved in seeing nature in the form of the white shark taking vengeance on people."

So now GWS no what it is to be vengeful. Far out......

Pointers attack boats and kayaks .

No question about that.

Benski - The issue with scientists is that their voice is over represented and often over valued.

As you just stated, they know fuck all.

And a lot of the scientists that are quoted have little background in sharks, let alone pointers.

Why should their opinions be given any weight ?

Rabbits go back and read what I wrote. I'm not Attributing motivation to white shark attacks but saying that for a certain percentage of people they are symbolic of nature taking revenge. This is just my theory feel free to disagree with but don't misrepresent it.

Benski thanks at work on a mobile now so will sit down and read your post properly when I get home.

Several documented attacks on kayaks, surf skis, SUPs and tinnies here in the last few years.

I do find it fascinating Freeride.

You've got a point - more people are aware of what is happening in an environmental sense to the world, so for some, I expect the GWS is a symbol of nature's "fightback" as you say.

Just quietly, I hope to live to see a cyclone take out Surfers Paradise in the ultimate schadenfreude, so I suppose it's a related theme.

There's little doubt that some of the extreme left would like to see zero means of shark control, and then see any human deaths from sharks as collateral damage (Bucher for sure).

More to the point, I'm so dubious of articles in most media outlets these days - the majority is clickbait and there to stir shit, like old mate Gary Linnell's article.

Do these people really believe what they're writing or is it just part of their job?

Are we suckers for not seeing through what are essentially sales techniques?

The comments section of the Guardian is somewhere between tragic and hysterical, a bunch of urban and suburban kids trolling each other.

This very much links in with Blowin's comment previously -

He said "And I'd say the majority of these people are actually projecting a virtue signaling love of nature to abrogate against a sub conscious gnawing that they would rather jam a cricket bat in their arse than be exposed to the harsh reality of nature in any meaningful way."

Sure some would see the GWS as fighting back against the human oppressors but I'm not sure how widespread this really is.

Blowin you delightful piss-taker,

Scientists voices are over represented? If only that were true we might get somewhere. Most of the time our voice is ignored. As for over-valued, I'll leave you to your opinion. I don't actually see that one way or the other.

I just summarised a tiny fraction of research on white sharks in Australia that tell you quantitatively which sharks are reproductively connected, what they eat and how one set of catch rates have changed over 60 years in NSW and that's fuck all to you? You must know a lot more than the rest of us!

But why should scientists' opinions be given any weight? Basically because they're trained to look at all available information and identify the inferences that are possible from it. And if society read them closely, like actually read what they publish (which they would if their voice was over represented), you'd find the nuance that comes with that. You'd see where they state what they know with what degree of certainty and what they don't.

It's a common whinge that scientists don't know as much as practitioners (like commercial fishers for example). And of course there's some things fishers know that some scientists might not (I wrote about that in another thread earlier in the week). But if scientists were a group whose opinions deserved no weight, they wouldn't be partly funded by industry groups like fishers and others.

Anyway mate, I know you love a wind up. I'm not interested in an argument because I know you know what I'm saying is true ;-)

Benski do you know what data they are collecting from the tagging program?

Benski do you know what data they are collecting from the tagging program?

Benski do you know what data they are collecting from the tagging program?

Benski - Sorry mate, I genuinely believe that scientists are given too much influence in a debate such as this.

Who was it that declared the pointers threatened ?

And that was 25 years before the present day where scientists openly admit that they have no idea of population estimates.

So a theory - that of near extinction was postulated , without evidence - and now there is an uphill battle to eradicate the inertia created by this theory before a new reality can be acknowledged.

Get it ?

And this Powter fella, quoted by AndyM stating that the decline in numbers hasn't been arrested by the cessation of detrimental activities !?!?

Huh ?

So he's not sure how many there were - but they were definitely nearly extinct - but he's pretty sure that since all forms of human depletion of Pointer stocks have stopped, then there's probably less now.

Even though humans are the only real cap on population numbers.

And then he says that numbers of pointers probably wouldn't have bounced back because there is a 17 year mininmum maturity before reproduction therefore the new generation would only have been pupping for 3 years - as though the year of protection started with a baseline of zero pups !

Maybe Pointer numbers were down, but that was more closely correlated to the number of mammalian prey species rather than any overpredation from man on their numbers directly and with the reappearance of mammalian prey species they are now more prevalent in the nearshore waters that this prey inhabits ?

What I am saying is this - who does the media turn to ? Who does the government and therefore society , grant the powers of decision making ?

The scientists.

In any debate , the great quelling of opposing opinion lies in the query - " Are you a marine biologist ?"

Scientists have their place for sure.

But until they have any facts, that place is amongst the mob.

A place at the table is reserved for those with experience when empiric quantification is lacking.

Funny how when I asked the DPI Dilettantes repeatedly if my GW was tagged or not they just wouldn't reply. Completely Non-Comm. Pagans..

http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/western-australia/wa-shark-attacks-evide...

A lot of science now in this realm seems to drift awfully close to advocacy.

I'd say the science so far can be classified as opinion.

No more, no less.

If it's a dissection of a Pointer you're chasing then I'd be asking a marine biologist.

If it's contextual information , I'd be more likely to be questioning someone that has even SEEN a Pointer as opposed to : http://www.byronnews.com.au/news/culling-of-sharks-and-netting-calls-dis...

wheres smux when ya need him?

Blowin,

Totally appreciate your perspective mate but not surprisingly I disagree with a few points. On a couple of things you are incorrect.

First, you said...

"Who was it that declared the pointers threatened ?

And that was 25 years before the present day where scientists openly admit that they have no idea of population estimates.

So a theory - that of near extinction was postulated , without evidence - and now there is an uphill battle to eradicate the inertia created by this theory before a new reality can be acknowledged."

That's not true. I've just spent 10 minutes reading the white shark recovery plan from the feds and it explains what evidence was available when they were listed as vulnerable (never listed as endangered). Basically it was a few papers including an analysis of the catch data from the meshing programs we've already discussed and a report by CSIRO (of which Barry Bruce was a co-author).

That csiro report gets pretty heavily cited in the recover plan and explicitly states in the exec summary, "Neither a stock assessment nor an estimate of population size is yet possible for Australian waters." And further, on page 95, "...it must be emphasised that this is not a stock assessment and we cannot currently draw conclusions about population size." The second last statement of the exec summary is: " There is no evidence to suggest that white sharks should be upgraded from vulnerable to endangered under protective legislation."

The scientists aren't making those theories you're complaining about. They've been reporting the data as it stands and been clear about its uncertainties from the start. But you have to read the research to know that. Otherwise you're very incorrectly shooting the messenger.

The way these things work is that scientists provide a summary of evidence and politicians make the call on policy. It's always been this way. They often listen to scientists, or they claim they do, but very often they don't. If you read that report, they spend a lot of time stating that things are poorly known and that the drive to have the species listed was from "...pressure exerted by conservation groups and sectors of the general community..."

Here's the report to read for yourself.

Further, you said, "Maybe Pointer numbers were down, but that was more closely correlated to the number of mammalian prey species rather than any overpredation from man on their numbers directly and with the reappearance of mammalian prey species they are now more prevalent in the nearshore waters that this prey inhabits ?"

The thing is, you might be right. And my personal suspicion has been that the increase in whale numbers is sure to have helped the species. But, we have absolutely no evidence to say if that is true or not. You and I are basically talking rather intelligently out of our arses. If your job is to figure out the status of a population and why it has changed (if it has changed) these kinds of things are pure speculation. If you hang your hat on the "there's more whales so that's why there's more sharks" without actual ecological process based evidence (i.e. as in you've only got purely correlative data and no known process basis - remember recent dietary studies show they're generalist predators not exclusively targeting whales so there's every indication they'd survive just fine without em), then you're very quickly out of a job. So while you and I might be right, there's little evidence to state it's actually an important driver of increased population size, and we don't even know if there has been an increase in the pop size yet. So it looks like a couple of clowns talking out of their arses when the scientists who've actually examined the fatty acid content of shark tissues from the region know a little bit more (see my lengthy post to freeride where the paper is linked on their diet analyses).

Then you said, "Who does the government and therefore society , grant the powers of decision making ?

The scientists."

As I said above, it was the conservation community who pressured the govt to list the species as vulnerable. The scientists said from the start, we don't really know because the data is inconclusive. But you've got to read the science before you'd know that, so that's on you man. Direct your criticism properly, it took me 2 minutes to find this stuff and then a few more to scan one of the main reports about the situation.

And if you look over that report, you'll see that the information Malcom and Bruce gathered came from fishers, fisheries records, meshing, cage dive sightings among other things.

There's no question that unless asked about something in their area of expertise, a scientists' opinion on something is no more valuable than anyone else's. I agree with you on that for sure. Sometimes they might be asked what is the best option, a shark cull or a netting program, and they might have expertise to advise on what would be the most effective given the known causal factors of attacks.

A scientist voicing an opinion against a cull because they don't like killing animals is indeed no more valuable than yours or mine. But an opinion that a cull wouldn't work because of X, Y and Z, is a different thing if that scientist has an expertise in the processes that increase the risk of attack. And you'd expect them to lay out the basis for that.

So the TLDR here is, scientists don't ever make policy, they provide advice to guide it. The scientists the govt was listening to when this species was listed as vulnerable have been up front about this from the start, you can read that for yourself. They weren't pushing the conservation angle, the conservationists were.

Thing is Benski , as you can witness in the link I provided above, scientists are granted extrajudicial gravity to their subjective opinions due to their credentials.

Why is a senior lecturer at a major university dispensing advice on the ethics of shark nets ?

Overreach of his position can inordinately influence many people - you can just picture the bullying he and his kowtowing students would deliver to a young student that is ambivalent towards the fate of the odd fish in the pursuit of human safety - and it is this abuse of a priveliged position that I object to.

It's not surprising that the media should deliver biased , opinionated editorial but I'd expect more from a career scientist whose entire profession is underpinned by the veneration of objectivity.

That's a very different point from what you raised in your previous posts.

But to be fair, old mate is entitled to his opinion. And he's entitled to express it if asked too. But his opinion as expressed in a phone interview for a newspaper is not going to have any influence on policy. It's meaningless. And it wasn't a scientific question it was an ethical one. That's fair game for any citizen. If people can't see the difference and relative value of the opinion it's hardly the fault of the fella who got to spout it.

I gotta call you out on the bullying line though mate. Come on that's crap. You've got no idea what he's like when teaching and you've got no idea how robust he likes discussion in classes. I know when I'm teaching I don't give two hoots what the students think but I'll regularly say provocative stuff to get arguments flowing from them. Let em argue it out to see all sides. Happens all the time. The only time I've ever seen a lecturer shut down a student was when the kid lectured him about God creating the world in a week during a class on evolution.

I don't get your point on god creating the world in a week.

You think it took him less than a week ?

Good talks Benski.

Cheers.

Haha! Wash your mouth out. Time didn't exist when she created our immaculate world in which we are blessed to exist.

So while im here I will point out the primary causes of the shark attack problem, from a shark attack survivors pov not the sharks and PC. The surrounding stuff I see. I research everything from the Economics to Theology to Naturalism surrounding this.

You have to to get a proper understanding of the surrounding sciences. I have been forced to as the science doesn't exist. Naturalists (Unsold) like Bob McDonald have been incredible help. Kudos. Henry Makow is just one Theologian. Amazing writer.

1 - Marine Parks in NeoLiberal-Zionist ideology are for resources claiming. Its for 'protecting' the BIOMASS for profit, NOT for environmentalism as projected to us. Its a clever ruse. This can be seen in my photobucket. The MP diagram with red dots.

2 - The GW's protected status is the Pagan Communist UN 'Earth before Humans' policy. Same with Brown Snakes and trees, branches etc. Fire kills more than ever. Why? This is where it goes Pagan as 'science' is corrupted by 'grants and donations'. The doctrine is filtered thru all 3 tiers of govt. Hence their silence to me. Another Pagan crime I have found is the crime of Usury. They are connected.

How can we find a solution without finding the causes? As I said in a previous comment I know lots of people that would like to tell their story. Thousands of people affected by this murderous attention seeking display of PC. Hardly anyone has paid attention to the damage inflicted. Its just an unnecessary crusade against the Human.

I believe 'science' sold part of its soul when Nixon took the US dollar off the Gold Standard. Enabling printable money allowed science to be sold off to the highest bidder as per Corp style. This is a big factor to me. Believe what you will but at least read some.

So the people that pushed Nixon to do such are Zionist Pagan Communists. Buying science and education has always been on their agenda. To absorb everything like a sponge. Like a Vampire, and my guess is Bram Stoker based his book Dracula on the Zionist Parasitical Nature! Just a guess. Marine Parks are Zionist-NeoLiberal Doctrine.

We are held in an old Babylonian Spell of materialism and egos. Supported with false flag terror and propaganda and crass porn we have been distracted cleverly.

Land seizing is one of 'their' Protocols. Marine Parks are land..and it stacks up. Pieces.

In much the same way as 'Israel' is absorbing Palestine. Same people.

They are dependent on PC and Character Assassination at this point with sharks-me.

Great points raised by both Benski and Blowin. But I would suggest that the scientists are providing opinions where they are asked for facts. In this case, we all agree we don't have enough facts to make valid points or strategies. It is clear that the conservationists have the greatest influence on the governments decisions. In this case, there really needs to be 'non popular' (with conservationists) short term action to address this. The government has openly stated that it is the surfers responsibility to have shark repellent devices and that is their short term answer.
I suggest that is not good enough.

Creation in a week - now there is point for discussion (not)

@benski - your recent posts have been excellent. rational, insightful, balanced and calm.

@ benski and blowin - good to see contrary opinions discussed without inflammatory bullshit. congrats guys.

On the subject of scientists and their opinions. Weren't they, wasn't it, the "scientists" who told us, the world, that asbestos and nicotine were OK? Hmmm.

Benski writes "The only time I've ever seen a lecturer shut down a student was when the kid lectured him about God creating the world in a week during a class on evolution."

Bahahahahahahaha

Frankly expecting 'scientists' to come out and advocate for the culling or killing of GWS in their natural habitat for the sole purpose of protecting recreational surfers/divers is laughable.

Marine biologists doing anything other than attempting to conserve native species in this country is utterly anthropocentric and frankly delusional.

We have a Ballina tagged GWS pinged around the Pt Lincoln -Sleaford bay area SA

Why only native species Bum Acid ?

I suppose that you're all for the culling of " Feral Pests "such as rabbits, foxes and even lantana ?

You're not xenophobic are you cobber ?

I totally agree Bum-Acid.

Marine scientists can and should be making the argument from the ecological perspective. Thats their job.

But when they stray into arguing against the effectiveness of shark mitigation-when they ask governments to act from the evidence base and not emotion and they ignore the evidence base themselves when they advocate a position- then they start haemorrhaging credibility.
As Powter noted, Govts are tasked with public safety, it's probably their chief raison d'etre. And Humans have been in and using inshore waters since the beginning of our time on this planet. In fact we may even have evolved from a kind of aquatic ape.
Thats a contentious position, but there's ample evidence humanity has evolved to be in and use the ocean. So any claims that we are somehow entering sharks territory when we step off the sand and therefore deserve everything we get are not only ahistorical but evolutionarily myopic.

Suggesting that humans are somehow entering some foreign domain when we are in the ocean and that therefore we have no rights to protect ourselves from predation is frankly a bizarre concept. It makes no sense on any level except at the most extreme misanthropic one.

Biologists usually work/rely on mathematicians when stock assessments require standardisation of catch data, interpretation of tag/recapture data and the running of models. Hopefully in doing so the mathematicians ask them the right questions.

I'm not overly familiar with the historic beach meshing data but like all logbooks there are no doubt some shortcomings. I think operators have only being trained in shark ID relatively recently. Back in the 50s everything was either a white, tiger, grey nurse or bronze whaler; and somewhat cynically it was possibly in their best interest to exaggerate catches of dangerous shark species.

Some more to factor in to whats doing on our once fine planet. This increase in Hawaii is likely the same MP issue we have in Australia not rads like this says. We are a US lapdog and as Pagan Bush Jr declared the ocean around Hawaii a National Monument the same time as we got MP's! Its a dicky site this one as a lot of Alt Media sites are.

Just a quick thank you to folks here not flaying me while I share my opinion. I will also ask everyone reading this to study the terrible lessons Protocol 10-5 teaches us all . Me as well. I am included in this clever mind trick much more than yourselves, and I have to keep a clear and open mind while I search for why so many are being killed for nothing.

I will leave it to you all find to out for yourselves what is going on in Hawaii (northern shores first) and America's north west coastline and then you can Extrapolate for yourselves. Millions are leaving Cali. Sharks are just part of a bigger problem.

Cheers..

http://xraymachines.info/article/352355438/as-fukushima-radiation-destro...

Very surprised there hasn't been a dedicated SN fuku thread tbh. The number of food chain stories out there on the web, and their details, are disconcerting. 3 coriums still not found, water still leaking enormous amounts of a soup of radionucleides into the N Pacific... silence... We have more quixotic environmental issues to debate, however.

Not sure how many people have heard about Chillax wax but Neil the inventor is trying to crowd fund the next stage and that is to actually see if it works with white sharks at the Neptune islands.

https://joeycrowd.com/chillax

Fark, what a discussion!

Props to all, covering the limits to scientific knowledge, the fact that scientific observation is then used by certain groups to progress their pet topics (who woulda guessed!), misinformation, misinterpretation etc etc.

Benski, nice work, I would only disagree on one aspect that scientist report while others make decisions. Scientists do advocate positions, which is a political rather than a scientific pursuit, and in some cases they do with less than stellar data sources.

It is fair enough to argue about the GWS population issue, crikey, it's been 'vulnerable for 20+ years now, except it hasn't been and that was never actually verified. Who would thunk that? Not me. Now what I suspected was dodgy data was actually never really stated by the scientists, and yet somehow that came about.

Lenny, I wish you well, but conspiracy theories always blow up on the basis that they require co-operation between humans, and that just doesn't happen on a local, national or global scale.

My position has moved from one of being a little agnostic to thinking bugger that, culling a few sharks in northern NSW is a defensible position. It seems hard to believe that a scientist could provide proof that such a move wouldn't change anything, but easy to believe that they could offer that opinion. Hard to imagine that killing sharks that come close in to shore won't have some affect on the population of sharks that come in close to shore.

But ferrying them out a couple of km's to sea after catching them on a drum line seems the very essence in futile behaviour.

I'd rather surf without having to obsess about being eaten by a shark. Call me an apex predator hating bastard if you will. It's highly possible they were never under threat and it is highly likely they are not under threat right now, not on east coast oz at least.

While anecdotal, it's pretty clear that something dastardly is going on up Freeride's way, shark-wise.

"Lenny, I wish you well, but conspiracy theories always blow up on the basis that they require co-operation between humans, and that just doesn't happen on a local, national or global scale."

You sure about that ?

Would it be hard for you to believe that there is a collection of people colluding to reduce the power and unity of Australian workers ? Also to drive down wages and skew the distribution of wealth towards capital and the wealthiest percentile of the population even more greatly than it ever is ?

And they are organised and cooperating at local, regional and national levels ?

And they are in the media 24/7 and members include the Prime Minister of Australia.

PS I won't call you an apex predator hating bastard , cause you're not.

You are the apex predator.

Pointers only exist because collectively we allow it.

batfink, this is not aimed at you specifically, but your comment "obsess about being eaten by a shark?" is at the heart of the hysterical mindset on this issue. if it was what you intended then you at least had the courage to say is straight.

sure spend the money on a targetted cull... who knows, maybe the average deaths will drop back to 1 per year and we can all feel so much safer. obsess is the operative word. but the question begs, what are we obsessing about?

About getting ripped into pieces of meat by an overwhelmingly aggressive animal that is trying to consume you alive as your loved ones watch in horror from the beach.

I think that's what he meant anyway.

I put the same questions that I asked Dr Powter to an academic with a biology degree and whose PhD project (in Australia) was Habitat and Dietary Selectivity of Nearshore Shark Populations.

Q. Do you believe that there are more or less Great White sharks now compared to 20-30 years ago? Is what we’re seeing now the rebound in population since GWS were protected?

A. No, I do not believe GWS numbers have gone up. Although shark population size is very difficult to measure, globally, most shark species are in decline, including GWS. In Australia, GWS were heavily overfished in the 1970s and 80s, which lead to a massive downturn in their population. Because GWS live for a very long time, and have few offspring, it is unlikely that the recent protection measures have had enough time to help the Australian population recover. It will take a very long time (>100 years) to see a full recovery. Even if there has been an increase in GWS numbers, their current population size in Australia is far less than its historical levels before we started targeting it in the fishery.
Increased number attacks is not likely related to a population increase in GWS as I don't believe it is really increasing. It is important to rememver that shark attacks are highly sporadic events, so looking at the number of attacks in 1 year, or even over 5 years, is not helpful for determining if there is an increase. We need to look over longer periods of time. When we look over a 50 year period the number of attacks in Australia has increased proportionately with the size of the Australian population and the number of people swimming in the ocean. This would indicate that the current surge in attacks (which is still very low when you consider the number of people that use that water each day in Australia), does not represent a true increase in the relative number of attacks.

Q. It seems to be generally acknowledged that nets are too indiscriminate to be publicly acceptable but what problems do you see with “smart drum lines” which aim to enable tagging of sharks which are then released alive?

A. In my experience, the biggest factors that determine whether a shark survives being caught on a hook is how it is physically handled when released, and how long it is on the hook. Smart drum lines have the potential to reduce the amount of time a shark spend on the line, so that could be very helpful to increase survival. But direct comparisons between smart and traditional drum lines in a study of some sort would be needed to know what the effect is on survival rates.

Q. What are your thoughts on ocean-users exercising personal responsibility eg. purchasing shark repellants? Do you feel that it should be up to governments to protect the public in this situation?

A. I think that if a person chooses to swim in the ocean, just like when they get in a car, that you are assuming a degree of personal responsibility and accept a degree of risk. I like to compare it to driving a car. The government put laws in place to govern speed and all traffic laws, you are required to train and study to be allowed to drive, we enforce the law with traffic cops and thus use negative reinforcement to help ensure compliance. And of course, if the car is not deemed safe, it does not get a road worthy and you can't drive. All these government rules and regulations help keep us safe. And then you as the individual know not to drive when tired or after drinking, you should drive defensively, you must have insurance. Despite all this, fatal car accidents still happen all the time, and while we never think we will be in a car accident, we all acknowledge that it could happen. We accept that risk every time we get in the car.
It is the same with swimming in the ocean. There are many non-lethal methods the government can and does implement to use reduce the chance of attacks, and people can use common sense to avoid shark encounters, don't swim in murky water, or at night, or in areas where fisherman are working, or in areas where there is a history of attacks. But there will also be a degree of risk, and you have to accept that if you want to go swimming. So ultimately, a lot of it comes down to personal decision making and responsibility.
I do think the government has a big role to play (as I address in the next section), but there will always be risks, same as driving.

Q. Do you feel that Shark Smart Apps and similar as well as the use of drones would be sufficient? Would you like to see any other shark control measures trialed or implemented?

A. I think the new surveillance tools are very important to people's safety. You can't expect people to make smart or well informed decisions if they don't have all the facts. These tools give them more information to make decisions about where and when to go swimming. I think right now they are the best bet.

You'll have to be more specific when referencing your academics Andy.

How old is this person ie general experience, what sharks are they studying for their PhD, how much actual oceanic experience , where are they from , have they ever worked with pointers and how extensively ?

Cheers batfink, bonza and others for the tips of your hats. I sometimes go overboard on these forums getting stuck into whatever literature I can so I'm glad to read it's interesting to people.

Regarding scientists, absolutely they argue positions I totally agree. There's been a push among some in the science community to do so more and more. I can get on board with some of it (like if you want to reduce the number of shark bites and attacks the best way would be X given our available evidence) but it does stray beyond what I'm comfortable with sometimes. But it's usually pretty clear I think. My main point here was that wasn't the case for white sharks. At least as far as I could tell. The science community, when writing papers and reports for policy, have been upfront from the beginning about the limits of what they could state with any certainty.

I do disagree entirely with what some have said that the scientists have been offering opinion instead of data on this issue. AndyM has asked two scientists for their opinions and they've kindly provided it. Unfortunately they haven't provided a lot of detail on the basis for that but regardless they were asked their opinions and gave them. Fair enough but that's not going to influence policy. As far as I could find in those lengthy posts I wrote, when asked by decision makers in the gummint, they provide data and clear caveats around them and their interpretation. Not opinions at all in that case.

In the media they have a right as any citizen to voice an opinion, though as I said I'm not completely on board with that (and I recognise as blowin said, they get more exposure in the press than your average Joe), but when it comes to provision of information I think they've been pretty straight up. And in this new world of the internet we all get to say our piece too. If we want more exposure we've just gotta figure out how to make the thread go viral like when Craig found Slater's pool!

Just wana share this cancer tip with you all. Im a chronic reader. My 1st book was JAWS at 14 ironically lol. My authors are well researched before I waste any time reading them. In my 2nd life I don't have time to waste. Busy busy,,so if the JFK shooting team and cancer prevention interests you have a look. Also I will add some other favourite writers-sites of mine. Make your own mind up with Occams Razor and Scientism factored in.

http://humansarefree.com/2016/10/big-pharma-hid-from-us-fruit-that.html

http://russia-insider.com/en
http://www.globalresearch.ca/
http://journal-neo.org/
http://dissidentvoice.org/

I'll add these 4 favourites also.

https://geopolitics.co/2015/05/01/the-khazarian-mafia-part-2/
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2016/10/11/the-khazarian-mafia-in-hollywood/
http://www.zerohedge.com/
http://enenews.com/

I also read from archaeologist and writer Jon Gray. His stuff borders on spiritual but he is very clued in. Worth a look for sure. Good luck punters..

Incident at Sharpes this morning?
Phil Myers instagram.
I haven't heard anything else about it.

Update:
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/surfer-at-ballina-lucky-to-escape-ser...

Another very lucky victim,big shark by the looks of that photo,cant believe he walked away with only a couple stitches.Clear water,sunny day,mid morning.......joke right.?

Would be a worthwhile experiment floating boards of various colours and patterns in the strike zone.

Are the gws eyesight that good?
I would of thought that looking from underneath up at the board, nearly all colours would look darkish/black?

Speculating here.
Most of the pics I've seen have the boards hit in the tail area.
There is is stripe theory, or either put two big black GWS eye stickers near the tail to show em they're being looked at.

Ha Ha - Mr Baird - the eco net experiment could have paid for Proven Shark deterrent one dead white in the nets and bingo... watch this space.

dont sharks use electric current to hunt?? If so,why when we tag the shark,install some type of shock generator,so that when they come close to the passive detecters,it sends out a signal to the tag which gives the shark a shock.NOt a rocket scientist,but surely the shark would get the message and leave the area.Saves money,no nets,no harm everyone happy

Goofyfoot, evidently they primarily hunt by sight, don't see in the blue/green spectrum and their eyes are configured differently to ours so things would be perceived in a different manner from below. I believe from what I have read that the idea behind the alternating black & white stripe design on the underside of surfboards appears to them as multiple objects not one. By the way this is only what I've read and I'm not keen on a field test!