The Ugandan kob (Kobus kob thomasi), male,Queen Elizabeth NP, Uganda, 2016.
The Ugandan kob is a subspecies of the kob, a type of antelope. Only the males have horns, which are lyre-shaped, strongly ridged and divergent.
Males are slightly larger than females, being 90 to 100 cm (3.0 to 3.3 ft) at the shoulder, with an average weight of 94 kg (207 lb), while females are 82 to 92 cm (2.7 to 3.0 ft) at the shoulder and on average weigh about 63 kg (139 lb). Apart from the throat patch, muzzle, eye-ring and inner ear, which are white, the coat is golden to reddish-brown, the color differentiating it from other kob subspecies. The belly and inside of the legs are white, and the front of the forelegs are black.
It is typically found in open or wooded savanna, within a reasonable distance of water, and it also occurs in grasslands near rivers and lakes.
Ugandan kobs are herbivores and feed largely on grasses and reeds.
The females and young males form loose groups of varying size which range according to food availability, often moving along watercourses and grazing in valley bottoms. Sometimes non-breeding males form their own groups. Ugandan kobs usually have a lek mating system, in which males defend small territories clustered on traditional mating grounds. Females visit these leks only to breed, and males provide no parental care. Each lek is associated with a female herd of about 100 individuals. Females begin to mate at the age of one, but males must normally wait for several more years. A single calf is born in November or December, after a gestation period of about nine months.
Ugandan kob appears on the coat of arms of Uganda. #Godfreytheguide #Uganda #Animals #Antelope.
www.interiorsafarisea.com
Wildlife crime encompasses a range of illegal activities that threaten the survival of animal and plant species worldwide. At its core, it includes poaching, the illegal hunting or capturing of wildlife, and the illicit trade of their products. This crime not only targets endangered species but also affects ecosystems and biodiversity as a whole. Understanding the definition and scope of wildlife crime is crucial for nature lovers and activists who seek to protect the delicate balance of our natural world. The severity of wildlife crime is underscored by its connection to organized crime syndicates, which operate across borders, making it a global concern that transcends local and national jurisdictions.
Poaching poses one of the most significant threats to wildlife, particularly for endangered species like elephants, rhinos, and tigers. These animals are often hunted for their ivory, horns, or skins, which are sold for high prices in illegal markets. The demand for these products fuels a cycle of violence and destruction, as poachers often use sophisticated techniques and equipment to carry out their activities. The impact of poaching extends beyond the immediate loss of individual animals; it can destabilize entire ecosystems and disrupt food chains, leading to broader ecological repercussions. For wildlife enthusiasts, recognizing the signs of poaching and its consequences is essential for advocacy and conservation efforts.
Illegal wildlife trade networks operate on a global scale, facilitating the movement of poached animals and their parts. These networks exploit weaknesses in legal frameworks and enforcement mechanisms, often involving corrupt officials and dangerous criminal organizations. The trade in wildlife is not limited to charismatic megafauna; it also includes a wide range of species, from reptiles and birds to plants. The complexity of these networks makes it challenging for law enforcement agencies to combat wildlife crime effectively. Awareness of the intricacies of these trade routes is vital for activists who wish to dismantle such operations and promote sustainable practices.
The impact of wildlife crime on biodiversity cannot be overstated. As species are driven to extinction, the natural balance of ecosystems is disrupted, affecting not only wildlife but also human communities that rely on these ecosystems for their livelihoods. The loss of biodiversity can lead to diminished natural resources, increased human-wildlife conflicts, and reduced resilience to environmental changes. For nature lovers, the health of ecosystems is intertwined with their passion for wildlife, making it imperative to address the underlying causes of wildlife crime and advocate for stronger protections for both animals and their habitats.
Legislation and enforcement play critical roles in the fight against wildlife crime. Many countries have implemented laws aimed at protecting endangered species and regulating wildlife trade. However, the effectiveness of these laws often hinges on enforcement capabilities and international cooperation. Successful prosecutions of wildlife crime serve as powerful case studies that highlight the importance of accountability in deterring illegal activities. Engaging local communities in conservation efforts is another key strategy to combat wildlife crime, as these communities can be both victims and protectors of wildlife. By fostering a sense of stewardship and providing economic alternatives, it is possible to build a more sustainable future for both wildlife and people.
Understanding the historical context of wildlife crime is essential to grasp the significant challenges faced in the global fight against this pressing issue. For centuries, humans have exploited wildlife for various purposes, ranging from sustenance to ornamentation. The rise of the industrial age marked a pivotal moment, as demand surged for animal products like ivory, fur, and exotic pets. This exploitation was often fueled by colonial expansion, where resources were extracted with little regard for ecological consequences. As a result, many species faced severe population declines, prompting early conservation efforts in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which laid the groundwork for modern wildlife protection laws.
As the 20th century progressed, wildlife crime evolved alongside changes in technology and commerce. The advent of global trade agreements and advancements in transportation made it easier for illegal wildlife products to cross borders. Organized crime syndicates began to recognize the lucrative potential of wildlife trafficking, leading to a dramatic increase in poaching, particularly of endangered species. Iconic animals like elephants and rhinoceroses became prime targets due to the high value of their tusks and horns. The illegal wildlife trade transformed from opportunistic poaching into a sophisticated, multi-billion-dollar industry, with complex networks operating across continents.
The impact of wildlife crime on biodiversity cannot be overstated. As species are driven to extinction due to poaching and habitat destruction, the ecological balance is disrupted, affecting entire ecosystems. This loss of biodiversity has far-reaching implications, from diminishing resilience against climate change to disrupting food webs. The decline of keystone species can trigger cascading effects, leading to the deterioration of habitats and the extinction of other flora and fauna. Recognizing these consequences has led to increased advocacy for stronger wildlife protection measures and greater awareness of the interconnectedness of species and ecosystems.
In response to the growing crisis, legislative frameworks have emerged to combat wildlife crime. International agreements such as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) aim to regulate and monitor the trade of endangered species. Countries have also enacted national laws to strengthen enforcement against poaching and trafficking. Successful prosecutions of high-profile wildlife crime cases serve as pivotal moments that not only bring justice but also raise public awareness. These cases illustrate the importance of collaboration among governments, NGOs, and local communities in the fight against wildlife crime.
Community involvement has emerged as a critical component in the fight against wildlife crime. Local populations are often on the front lines, witnessing the effects of poaching and habitat loss firsthand. Empowering communities through education, alternative livelihoods, and participatory conservation initiatives has proven effective in reducing reliance on illegal wildlife trade. By fostering a sense of stewardship for local wildlife, communities can play a vital role in protecting their natural heritage. Additionally, understanding wildlife trafficking routes and hotspots is essential for targeted enforcement efforts, as these areas often indicate higher levels of illegal activity. Engaging local stakeholders in these efforts not only aids in conservation but also promotes sustainable development, aligning the interests of both wildlife and people.
Cami Ciotta
MojoStreaming
Creator of an upcoming TV Series on Wildlife Crime - If you would like to learn more contact Cami at producer@wildlifecrimeseries.com
The case against trophy hunting
1)Trophy hunting defies all logic.
It’s a bizarre notion to shoot something you are trying to protect in the first place. Let’s take the example of wolves, which faced extinction not so long ago. Spending decades bringing them back from extinction makes no sense, only to begin killing them again.
2)Trophy hunting is unethical.
Most importantly, the practice is entirely unethical. It causes suffering to the hunted animal. Indeed this suffering exceeds much more in magnitude than the pleasure it gives the hunter! Mankind is supposed to be the protector and guardian of the planet and its inhabitants. Instead, post-industrial age, humans have treated our animals and our forests like expendable resources and garbage exclusively for their own selfish use and with complete disregard for everything else. The caveman of thousands of years ago had far more respect for our animals and forests and only killed to survive. Animal populations are collapsing and, inevitably, so will our civilization.
3)Trophy hunting does more harm to the very species it is supposed to protect
Trophy hunters make unsubstantiated claims that a small amount of controlled trophy hunting does not harm populations. However, this is not true. Trophy hunting can backfire and hurt the overall population of a species. Let’s take the example of lions. For trophy hunters, shooting the biggest and strongest adult male lion is the most desirable type of hunt by wealthy foreign hunters. However, it is a well-known fact that an adult male is the protector of his pride, protecting the females and other male offspring. If it gets killed, other male lions will attack and kill weaker lions in the pride to take over the leaderless pride, thus further reducing the numbers to the further detriment of the species. There are countless real-life examples of this phenomenon.
4)Does money from Trophy hunting help conservation?
There is no real proof that money raised by trophy hunting helps a species or local communities. I believe it is a misconception that revenues from trophy hunting help with conservation. This is what so-called” conservationists” would conveniently like the world to believe. On a broad scale, corrupt government officials, middlemen travel companies, and sports outfitters organizing the trophy hunt end up with the lion's share of the proceeds, and perhaps only a trickle goes to conservation and rural communities. I think the notion that trophy hunting helps conservation is like putting lipstick on a pig in a false attempt to hide its ugliness. The notion that Trophy hunting helps to protect the species is simply a guise to justify this gruesome practice. In all reality, it is simply providing a thrill to wealthy people who get a kick out of killing an endangered animal. True conservation activities should sustainably involve local communities, not benefit organizers, middlemen, and corrupt officials.
5)Trophy hunting undermines efforts to curb poaching.
What kind of mixed message are we sending poachers? It’s a double standard to come down hard on poachers who are simply trying to feed their families but greenlight wealthy thrill-seeking foreigners to hunt and kill animals. Poaching and trophy hunting is disgusting practices from a wildlife standpoint, especially for endangered species, which seem to attract an unusually large number of trophy hunters to hunt and kill these animals.
6)Trophy hunting is a lucrative big business making the case for even more trophy hunting
Because trophy hunting has become a big business, getting carried away and increasing quotas for the number of animals to hunt is easy. Corrupt politicians and organizers will find a way to make trophy hunting more lucrative for themselves at the detriment of the species.
7)Trophy hunting impairs genetic selection
As noted earlier, the most prized trophy hunts by wealthy foreigners granting them the most significant bragging and boasting rights are to take down the strongest males by targeting, for example, the ones with the most prominent horns of the most prominent tusks. This leaves only the less fit males in the population. Effectively, trophy hunting is weakening the DNA of a species over time.
Interestingly, even the original first nations inhabitants respected the leader of a pack, the strongest of the bunch. They would hunt the weaker animals for survival. Our modern civilization does not understand the importance of this simple but essential concept of genetic selection for the ongoing survival of a species.
8)Trophy hunting supports other harmful industries
Trophy hunting supports other industries that are detrimental to society by enabling weapons companies to make even more guns and fossil fuel companies provide dirty fuel for the long flights to take foreign trophy hunters to far away remote places to commit their heinous crimes against a harmless species already facing extinction.
These are just some of the reasons why trophy hunting should be banned entirely. So many humane ways can help protect a species facing extinction. Simple eco-tourism comes to
mind, where wealthy folks can take their families on safaris to see these animals in the natural setting. Shoot animals with your cameras, not rifles!
The extinction of a species is a global problem, not a local one. Imagine if every government across the globe donated a tiny tine minute fractional percentage of their tax revenues towards ending the extinction of species globally. This would make many resources available for conservation efforts to preserve a species. Far more than resorting to killing more of the same species!
I challenge anyone to argue otherwise and, more importantly, provide concrete evidence and data, to disprove my rationale for ending this cruel and inhumane practice of trophy hunting!
Munir Noorbhai
(Private citizen who wants to do right by animals before it is too late!)
Visit the discussion on Trophy Hunting: https://www.mojostreaming.com/video/685/trophy-hunting-debate-episode-1
As a wildlife filmmaker based in a country like India that is high on blue chip and large scale productions and popular voices doing voice overs, specializing in conservation filmmaking is harder than one can imagine.
India is home to Bollywood, an industry that producers over 300-350 Hindi language films each year, my conservation film on roadkills stands almost no chance of getting noticed.
This makes it a challenge to hit that mark with your target audience and get the publicity ball rolling.
How do I address this gap? Well, we make them feel emotionally attached to the animal.
You make it relatable.
You could look at the Big 5 or similar megafauna or make the story feel relatable and humanized. Personified.
Add the drama. Add conflict.
Add the sense of adventure and the idea of pursuing something.
Make them feel like their involvement in this story is worth their time :)
An alien civilisation coming across our solar system would name our planet Ocean, for most of Earth is under water. Being air-breathing and living on the bits that stick out, we mostly regard the vast liquid blue that surrounds us as a beautiful but often scary “other”. Billions of us, however, rely on it for food. This is part two of a series about the relationship between the creatures below the sea’s surface and the people in boats who catch them. Read Part One
Through a friend in 2011, Oliver Godfrey met Gary McFarlane, the then Port Elizabeth-based skipper of a demersal shark long-line boat called White Rose. When one of the crew was fired, he was offered a job. As a young photographer interested in wildlife, the chance to do some trips with him was appealing, so Oliver joined up on nine week-long trips. The next two months of shark catching would traumatise him for the rest of his life.
“Gary called himself Shark Slayer and he was that for sure,” Oliver told me after years of remaining silent about his experience. “They were fishing between PE and De Hoop further west. Every trip – and I did nine or 10 – they were (tonnes) of sharks. Smooth-hounds, soupfin sharks, disallowed species such as ragged-tooth sharks, hundreds of spotted gully sharks and hammerheads, including hundreds of pregnant sharks.
“Three great whites got entangled in the long-lines and killed while I was on board. The guys were indiscriminate. Hundreds of seabirds were hooked and killed – gannets, cormorants, albatrosses. There was big bycatch that was discarded dead. They were fishing next to – and I’m sure in – Marine Protected Areas [MPAs].
“I hung on longer than I should have to document what was going on, but I can tell you I ended up so broken by the massive carnage, the cruelty. Traumatised, depressed.
“I needed help to get the story out, but nobody would help. I was advised to drop it. I had all these photographs. They knew that and I got frightened. Then I had three break-ins in two months. My hard drive with the pictures was stolen.
“For years now I just left the story lying there. But it needs to be told because the killing hasn’t stopped; the great whites are almost gone. And some of the images were saved to the cloud as proof of my story. So now I’m telling you.”
That was how this story began. Could Oliver’s story be corroborated? The ocean is large, the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) does not place observers on these boats; there are no snoopy members of the public out there in the empty sea; crews are dependent on skippers for jobs so won’t talk. You can pretty much do as you please ... which is why information from an “insider” like Oliver is rare and valuable.
There are around 535 species of sharks in the world, one in three listed as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered. My checking began with the apex predator poster-fish: great whites.
Despite being protected in South Africa, they’re missing in action, collapsing a billion-rand cage-diving tourist industry. Why? Four reasons have been suggested by a range of sources:
Let’s begin with the orcas. When the shark cage-diving industry in Gansbaai crashed for want of viewing great whites in 2017–2018, two orcas, Port and Starboard, were blamed. Five white sharks, their livers bitten out in a way typical of orca predation, washed up in Gansbaai. Culprits found and convicted.
But then a study by University of Exeter scientist Robin Fisher noted that white sharks had started declining in Gansbaai in 2013, before the arrival of the two orcas, which had simply added to the problem. It was more likely, he said, that the orcas, which before had not predated on white sharks, were doing so because of the overfishing of pelagic fish stocks.
So orcas may have moved inshore where they started preying on white sharks. However, the decline of white sharks in False Bay, starting in the early 2010s, actually matches the increase in effort by demersal shark long-line boats. As smaller sharks are also the whites’ main prey, this and not orcas, said Fisher, was likely to have precipitated their population to crash.
A later study (discussed below) would confirm that whites began declining in Gansbaai and False Bay before the orcas arrived.
So could the problem be over-fishing? Sharks are caught in massive numbers worldwide – one study put the number at anything between 63 and 723 million hooked a year. A study by TRAFFIC on trade dynamics put South Africa’s export of shark meat between 2012 and 2022 at 14,000 tonnes.
Great whites, being apex predators, are relatively few in number – a study done by Alison Towner in 2013 estimated there were around 900 white sharks left in South Africa, while Dr Sara Andreotti of Stellenbosch University put that number in 2016 between 353 and 522. By fish standards that’s not many.
They’re very general hunters but have a selective preference for other sharks. A study of the stomach contents of 591 whites confirmed their main prey was smaller sharks such as bronze whalers, smooth-hounds and soupfin sharks, which were being targeted by long-line boats based in Gqeberha. They belong to three companies, Fisherman Fresh owned by Sharmilla van Heerden, Letap Fishing owned by Imraan Patel and Unathi Wena, whose MD is Tasneem Hajee. All are no strangers to controversy. Calls to all three were not returned and a list of questions to Van Heerden were not answered.
Unathi Wena and its boat White Rose are currently involved in a court case in Bredasdorp Magistrates’ Court charged with fishing in a MPA. In 2014 Fisherman Fresh, was charged with illegally exporting 95 tonnes of shark and octopus to Australia, the sharks to be used in sales of fish and chips. Van Heerden was eventually acquitted.
For many years members of the public have reported seeing the Gqeberha long-liners prowling around MPAs (and occasionally in them), pulling out thousands of sharks. Every now and then a reminder comes ashore. In 2018, shark heads began washing up on the beach at Kanon Rocks and the boats White Rose and Mary Ann appear to have been the source. In 2020 a pile of headless, gutted sharks past their sell date were found dumped on Strandfontein beach in False Bay.
In May 2019 the White Rose was caught allegedly fishing illegally in the De Hoop MPA. In the same month a second vessel, the tuna long-liner Prins Willem 1 was also arrested when it docked in Port Elizabeth. It had allegedly been illegally fishing in the Amathole MPA off East London. In both cases, a total security of R400,000 was paid and the catches were released.
According to Chris Fallows of Apex Shark Expeditions, who has worked with great whites in South Africa for more than 30 years, “in the late 1990s DFFE gave out demersal shark long-line permits and fishing for sharks in [False] Bay rapidly increased. By the mid to late 2000s we noticed a slow decline of white shark sightings at Seal Island, nothing drastic but an overall down trend.
“Suddenly, around 2010, three boats started fishing the resource hard. They learnt how, where and when to target the smooth-hound, soupfin, bronze-whalers and hammerhead sharks. Their technique was highly focused and localised to sites where these species gather. They deny catching hammerheads because they’re protected, but they do and we have evidence. Oliver got pictures.
“Their catches soared and our sightings of white shark in False Bay went through the floor. In a nutshell, there are no longer enough smooth-hounds and soupfins left in False Bay to sustain the white sharks for the eight months of the year they’re not at Seal Island.
“Add to this the octopus fishery – which started in earnest around the same time targeting the key food source of smaller sharks – and you have a double whammy.”
Department of Fisheries scientists knew these sharks were racing towards crisis point. They openly acknowledged that even if all fishing for these species stopped, the soupfin shark stock could not be sustainably fished even by 2070.
A report issued by Fisheries in 2021 said that “at current catch, the soupfin shark is likely to be commercially extinct in 20 years. Fishing pressure is also already too high on the smooth-hound shark. Given that a maximum of four vessels have been active and fishing at any point in time, the state of the soupfin and smooth-hound shark stock cannot sustain an increase in effort”.
The report added another concern: “There is a health concern related to sharks being consumed. Sharks over a certain size (12kg ~ 130cm total length) are not safe to consume due to high levels of accumulated methylmercury and arsenic (among others). For some species (predatory sharks like mako sharks and sevengills) it is likely that no sizes are safe to consume at all.”
While the department introduced slot limits (not to catch younger or more mature animals), their own research told them this alone would not be enough. For instance, in 2010 the department reported annual catches just by demersal long-liners of soupfin at 106 tonnes and smooth-hound at 110 tonnes.
To be sustainable, the maximum upper limit for smooth-hound sharks was calculated at 75 tonnes annually from 2016 onwards; yet in 2019, the minister reported in Parliament estimated catch levels between 2016 and 2019 at one-and-a-half to three times higher than that by demersal long-liners alone.
Limiting tonnage a no-go
Because limiting tonnage would make the industry less profitable, it hasn’t been implemented. According to DFFE scientists who spoke to me off the record, this is presently totally unsustainable. The 2023 Parliamentary debate on fisheries can be accessed here.
Here’s the thing: even though smooth-hound sharks are considered by the DFFE’s own stock assessment as endangered and soupfin as critically endangered, they are still kept on the target species list of the official permit for demersal shark long-liners with no maximum catch limit. However, growing concern may be reflected in that by October 2023 only one demersal shark long-line licence had been allocated.
Of course, those sharks are also caught as bycatch in other fisheries and by surf anglers and the final catch weight or composition is anybody’s guess.
But who’s watching? There are no fisheries observers on those shark boats, catches are only occasionally checked and the DFFE mostly relies on the commercial logbooks entered by the same boats to track catches.
According to Oliver, “when a catch was being offloaded at the port, there’s not a chance that every single specimen was inspected. It’s bullshit for DFFE to try to claim that. I don’t think the inspectors really knew what was on the catch list or off it. They just processed the paperwork, took the skipper’s word for it, and off the catch went to Australia.”
The great white problem may not be just about long-line fishing catching their prey. A parallel threat is along the beaches of KwaZulu-Natal – baited drum lines and shark nets, which do not only separate sharks from people, but are also devices aimed at killing sharks.
Despite being protected in South Africa, an average of around 28 white sharks have been killed by the Sharks Board alone every year since 1991.
According to Fallows: “On top of that source of mortality, when shark scientist Charlene da Silva of the Fisheries department did a test near Gqeberha with three demersal long-line sets they caught two great whites and killed one.”
“Let's do the maths,” renowned shark biologist Enrico Gennari tells me, sitting on the edge of his chair in agitation. “By the DFFE’s own numbers, three whites caught over three days means that in nine weeks (the time Oliver was on the White Rose) shark long-liners would have caught and killed more white sharks than what Oliver reported. So Oliver’s numbers are realistic. If we extrapolate what he saw to the average demersal shark long-line fleet of the last 10 or so years, it would equate to an average of 50 to 60 white sharks killed every single year”.
“When you add this to what the KZN Sharks Board kills, you have nearly 100 whites a year being taken out of an estimated population of at most 1,000, or maybe even half of that.
“Great whites reproduce very slowly, only a few pups a year. At best, a 10% annual loss on a population of 1,000 is unsustainable. And that’s likely why we start to see a decline year on year since the early 2013, after the increase in effort by the demersal shark long-line fishery.
“Of course the orcas added to the problem,” says Fallows, “but elsewhere, when orcas kill white sharks, they move away but come back. They don’t disappear. Here they have. It’s because their population is crashing”
A 2023 research paper in Ecological Indicators led by Dr Matt Dickens of the KwaZulu-Natal Sharks Board and a group of other scientists favours the redistribution theory. The paper, using what Gennari describes as simplistic inferences, claims the orcas chased great whites up the coast, but that their population is “pretty stable”.
“Their population status appears largely unchanged,” they write, “despite the substantial reduction in occurrence in False Bay and Gansbaai in the last five years. For the status of white sharks in South Africa to remain unchanged, the population must have redistributed along the South African coastline.”
Gennari disagrees. “White sharks are down in False Bay, Gansbaai, Mossel Bay. Maybe there are three to 10 in Plettenberg Bay and a shark cage-diving operator in Gqeberha tells me he just saw his first white shark this year in August. If all the sharks migrated up the coast, you should have had a big uptick on the KZN drum lines, but you haven’t seen that.”
That paper’s message suggesting the white population is stable with no reason for concern and echoed by the media, says Gennari, “is very dangerous and could sink the conservation of white sharks in South Africa forever”.
So where does that leave sharks in South Africa? The news is not good. “Fisheries are allowing the commercial fishing of endangered and critically endangered species,” says Fallows. “It’s unheard of. It’s like allowing gin trapping of wild dogs in the Kruger National Park.
“Our so-called ‘best managed fishery in the world’ – as DFFE claims – has ‘managed’ two species from vulnerable to endangered and from endangered to critically endangered. We’ve also lost our white sharks; we’ve lost our hammerheads.
“If this is the best fishery in the world, then the yardstick by which we measure these things is not merely low, it's subterranean. That’s really where we are. It’s disheartening.”
Back to Oliver Godfrey, the traumatised photographer on the White Rose. It’s likely what he was witnessing in 2011 was the beginning of the end of great whites on South Africa’s southern shores through direct white shark mortality and the demolition of their food source by four long-liners. If his story had been heard earlier, something might, just might, have been done to stop the decline. But it wasn’t.
“I come from a diving background. I absolutely love the ocean,” he tells me. “What I saw was totally, totally ruthless. I felt it was my responsibility to record this experience. At the time I was handing out information to people, but they just didn’t give a shit.
“There was no limit on the numbers caught or species size. They didn’t take the hooks out of bycatch they didn’t want, they just bashed the fish on the side of the boat or simply cut their head off to not waste time taking out hooks. The damage caused by shark long-lining is insane. It is absolutely fucking insane.”
It is clear that urgent action is needed. This includes the permanent withdrawal of the demersal shark long-line fishing permits and a switch by the Sharks Board to more modern and sustainable ways to protect bathers in KZN.
Meanwhile, the shark cage-diving industry is in freefall with no end in sight and the little fishing communities that it supported are hurting.
It is not just about white sharks, says Fallows. “They’re a poster species for all others of the ocean. If we can’t protect such an important creature so vital to South Africa’s tourism, then the rest of our seas are in deep trouble.” DM
This article first appeared on Daily Maverick and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
