In an ongoing debate over whether we should be feeding fish, including sharks, stingrays, and other marine life, divers tend to either be for or against it for a variety of reasons. Let’s discuss the implications of feeding marine life; you can use what you learn to decide if feeding fish is ever a good idea.
About Fish Feeding
Sharks and other fish are often fed by dive operators, in order to associate human visitors with food treats and to get them to either come closer, or to get them to actually interact with divers. The type of feeding depends largely on the species, with professionals handing dangerous interactions such as baiting sharks with frozen “chum-sicles.” While feeding wild animals has long been common practice in the ecotourism industry, and while feeding virtually guarantees that divers will be able to view the species they have come to see, it does have potentially negative effects on the wild animals we all enjoy.
Negative Aspects of Fish Feeding
What we may view as friendly, gregarious behavior among fish being fed could actually be aggression. For instance, in Hawaii, chub have started biting divers and snorkelers because they associate people with food. In some cases, the heaviest and most aggressive fish have scared away smaller fish or have over-dominated them to the point where diversity is decreased. In addition, feeding fish attracts more algae-eating fish, which can quickly overpopulate a reef. Over-feeding fish can disrupt the balance of life in a particular ecosystem, changing the fish’s natural habits and causing a negative chain reaction.
In the case of shark feeding, those who are opposed are concerned that sharks which lose their natural wariness of divers can quickly learn to approach quickly, and could even bite. In addition, sharks involved in an unnatural feeding frenzy may injure one another as they compete for freely offered food. Besides this, attracting several sharks to a single location where they are fed can mean that they are less active in their normal territories, lessening their natural role of removing dead or sick animals from reefs and other environments. Scientists are also concerned that when sharks hunt less, fish will feel less pressure to reproduce, creating a negative impact to the overall ocean environment.
In areas where shark feeding is allowed during the mating season, natural mating does not occur as it is supposed to; the sharks are more aggressive to one another than usual, and sharks that normally leave to go to alternate areas for mating tend to stick around, preferring to be fed. As world shark populations are rapidly declining, this negative impact causes a great deal of concern, and as a result more shark feeding operations are closed in deference to the mating season. In places where shark feeding has remained constant, with no pause for the mating season, scientists are reporting abnormally low genetic variety, which leads to less resistance to external stress, and a greater tendency toward disease.
Positive Aspects of Fish Feeding
In many places where fish are fed, local economies are beginning to thrive, thanks to dive tourism. Now, instead of overfishing, the local people are encouraging fish populations to grow, so that divers continue to come and encounter endemic species while spending money at resorts and other local venues, and helping communities to realize a greater level of economic stability.
This is particularly true when it comes to shark feeding, which occurs in the Maldives and the Bahamas with the grey reef sharks, and in South Africa with the Great White and Tiger sharks. Many of these encounters involve cage diving, with sharks being lured in by chum trails, then encouraged to strike a dummy before being fed scraps of fish, pig or goat carcasses, or other types of food. In some places, like Hawaii and the Galapagos, cage diving occurs with teaser bait only; the sharks are lured in with chum, but feeding is not carried out. While some communities require no incentive to keep shark populations healthy, others, like Fiji, share their diving profits with local fishermen, paying them to stop fishing for sharks and other endangered species.
It’s big business – on Moorea, shark diving provides an annual revenue of more than five million dollars, and it is estimated that a single lemon shark contributes more than two million dollars to the community over a twenty year lifespan. Researchers estimate that the same group of thirteen sharks at one site alone are seen 73% of the time; and those same thirteen are helping to save the rest by proving that sharks are worth more alive than they are dead.
While monetary contributions to a community help save local shark populations, fish and shark feeding also buys time, in a sense; allowing people in developing nations to learn more about marine ecology overall. By teaching people to develop sound environmental practices, and look beyond the direct value that ecotourism provides to communities, those who support fish and shark feeding hope that better environmental practices will become the norm, rather than the exception.
Finally, those who are in favor of fish feeding and shark feeding make the point that feeding these animals helps divers to gain a new appreciation for marine life and learn more about the creatures they are interacting with, thus providing a stronger incentive toward becoming better educated about marine life as a whole.
To feed or not to feed? Without a doubt, the answer probably lies somewhere between the two opinions. For instance, we should never feed fish foods that they cannot find in their natural environment; cheese, lunch meats, processed foods, and other so-called “treats” come to mind. In places where feeding sharks and other fish is helping to increase overall conservation efforts, then it is almost certainly justifiable. Scientists learn much from many of these encounters, and the rest of us can learn from them as well. So, make up your own mind about whether you want to support fish feeding activities or not, and if you do, remember not to feed fish in areas where it is prohibited. As with all other things, achieving balance should be a primary goal.