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91 Comments
- tomboy501, on 10/11/2007, -4/+36This whole story made my head hurt. Us humans have spent generations killing the seals. Now we are 'enlightened' and need to kill the sharks that are killing the endangered seals that we put in danger?? We should probably just leave the food chain alone at this point, no?
- inactive, on 10/11/2007, -3/+27a baby seal walks into a club...
- djcll6122, on 10/11/2007, -2/+10So are we the only species allowed to make other species extinct then?
- TheTaoOfBill, on 10/11/2007, -4/+12Careful. You're on digg.
That's like saying let's assassinate the pope in a catholic church. - ArizonaKid, on 10/11/2007, -4/+10If the seals can't save themselves, why should we interfere more with nature?
- UnoriginalMind, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7@olddirtycr (#6891948)
It's about SEALS, not PEOPLE.
RTFA. *****, it's in the description! - TheTaoOfBill, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7"Dude why did you have to make out with my sister?!"
"For science"
"oh okay cool!" - palehorse864, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7Incidentally, here is a picture of the chief scientist in charge of this request.
http://www.emerchandise.com/images/p/1RS/pdPH1RS0003.jpg - Junkyarddawg, on 10/11/2007, -3/+8Well, if we assume these guys haven't got tangled up in their own simulations, the monk seals may be few enough that every single individual is important to preserve genetic diversity, and I guess limited hunting of sharks around the breeding ground could save a couple of pups...
- Bdog2g2, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5They are now an "Axis of Evil"
- crote, on 10/11/2007, -2/+6At last the scientific community has gotten on board my campaign to rid the seas of the cartilaginous menace.
We can only pray it's not too late. - Junkyarddawg, on 10/11/2007, -4/+8Yeah, where is their sense of eco-friendliness? Tomatoes not good enough for them, huh?
- ersatzphi, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Or delicious soup!
- beefsupreme, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Sharks are a foreign presence endangering American, god-fearing monk seals. They are therefore evil and should be eliminated in order to protect freedom.
- EatingPie, on 10/11/2007, -6/+10FTA. "The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration proposes to kill up to 10 sharks this summer...."
Ten sharks total. That's not going to make ANY kind of dent in the shark population.
I stayed with a line fisherman on one of my trips to Hawaii. They have lost complete catches to sharks, who discover the fish on the lines and snatch them off.
Another friend of mine was out on a 2 week fishing trip. He begged the captain to let him jump in the water, and had to argue for an hour to get him to say yes. The instant the guy's feet hit the water, the captain yelled "Okay, out! Out of the water!" They pulled him out and the captain said, "Come here!" and took the guy in to look at the sonar. It showed a shark coming up out of the depths.
There's tons and tons of sharks on Hawaii. The fishermen and surfers hate them. We could argue about that hatred in another article, but the point is simple: killing 10 of the things won't matter one whit.
-Pie - Osjpr, on 10/11/2007, -2/+5No one should be surprised. While distasteful, this is normal ecological management. People should not be concerned with scientists, but countries that are hell bent on raping the environment and leaving it threadbare.
- polypropglop, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3If we kill off all the sharks, the monk seals will multiply and destroy Galapagos.
Thus proving the Theory of Evolution wrong. - edebolt, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3okay Drama Queens. They just want to reduce the shark population by 10 sharks. Its the same as allowing land based animal hunting quota's like deer which in some places are over populated and cause ecosystem damage due to overgrazing etc.
- TheTaoOfBill, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4Actually I think scientists would be pretty good at getting women considering love is all one big experiment.
- nerditup, on 10/11/2007, -2/+5I think this is actually how it happened.
Instead of evolving from bacteria, Aliens came to Earth and had sex with Ape's. Think about it, we always depict Aliens to look like these futuristic humans who have "evolved", big eyes, head etc. Well what if that's because we have a sense of what our true ancestors are. We just look like a mix between an ape and our Alien ancestors. - Rooster99, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4Cause it eats people?
- Osjpr, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3"It isn't our place to..."
Says the self-professed egoist. - phenolholic, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3just get a bunch of chinamen. they'll do it with no approval.
- richardhenry, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Why is he being dugg down? He makes a point. I fail to understand what we're thinking here? The seals are endangered, but many species have become extinct naturally. Let it happen - it's stupid of man to assume that as long as we are intelligent, the world needs to stay exactly the same no matter what. Change is natural.
- astn, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2There is no reason to kill Galapagos Sharks in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Having lived and worked out there for over a year, and knowing many people who work for the program in question (National Marine Fisheries Service - Protected Species Division - Hawaiian Monk Seal Program) what they are proposing to do is basically bad science--even within the program many of the people don't feel there is a good reason to kill these sharks. Ten sharks aren't going to make any difference (either to monk seal survival rates OR Galapagos Shark populations) however it (re)opens the door to killing other species to protect the Monk Seals.
I would add that this isn't the first time this has been done. At least one other time there was a program to kill Tiger Sharks at Tern Island (in French Frigate Shoals) to protect the monk seal population--which is a complete tragedy, since not only are populations of Tiger Sharks much less then Galapagos, but Tiger Sharks have huge ranges and seldomly stay at any one location long enough to have a real effect on Monk Seal population.
The largest problem, as I understand it, is that while mature monk seals are surviving as expected, the pups and "weeners" are not having survival rates as expected. And they don't know why. The body of research on Hawaiian Monk Seals is so small that the money they will waste on this project could be better spent on researching the animals more to find either a cause of the survival issue OR on more proactive programs that attempt to assist the animals in their early years (of which there is one program on Midway that is attempting to feed the one-year old Monk Seals until they "fatten up" enough to survive on their own). While that program is basically crap (and in fact killed one of the three seals they were trying to feed), with different people in charge or more professional oversight that would be a worthwhile expenditure.
A few things that were mentioned above that I'd like to comment on:
(a) Genetic diversity of the seals. The Hawaiian Monk Seal population was at one point extremely small (I believe less then 100 animals) and all the current seals are their progeny. So killing the sharks to protect the genetic diversity of the seals is poorly reasoned.
(b) 10 sharks means nothing to the overall Galapagos Shark population. While technically correct, the problem is when you open the door for humans to manage a species by killing (or attempting to kill) another species, it just doesn't work out as expected. It is no stretch to use statistics to prove that your 10 shark kills "helped" the situation and to use that as justification to kill 100 or 1000 sharks the following year. One of the problems endemic to that program (and many marine mammal programs in general) is that they focus on their cute little animal and forget the big picture.
(c) While it is certainly a possibility that the Hawaiian Monk Seal will eventually become extinct, the reasons for that are at least in large part due to human's influence. I'm no tree-hugger, but I think that some energy should be put into trying to protect an animal that we've nearly exterminated. The Caribbean Monk Seal is already extinct, and the Mediterranean Monk Seal is close. - polypropglop, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3How in the hell do these PETA freaks sustain their numbers?
You'd think after all that in-breading with animals and Pamela they would have died out by now. - RamboJesus, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Nooo!! Don't kill the sharks!!
yeah. do it. kill them. - Almadiel, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Maybe we shouldn't screw around with the food chain, it has almost never has positive results. You can't protect nature while getting in its way.
- olddirtycr, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3@unoriginalmind
My comment was directed at eatingpie, who said that all surfers hate sharks in Hawaii. I was implying that that hatred was based off the fact that "omg they have sharp teeth and seek out human's flesh" mindpoint that people tend to have.
RTFC (Read the ***** comments)
P.S. I read the article before I made that comment
I'm well aware it deals with seals and sharks killing something more than we already killed the seals. - EatingPie, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Wow, Dugg Down for pointing out it's only 10 sharks... with examples to illustrate how massive the population of sharks is in the pacific (a 1 minute swim at sea attracts a shark almost instantly!).
Surfers are attacked by sharks, and it's not a misconception that they have sharp teeth. Yeah, they really do, and they really bite people -- surfers are more likely to be attacked because of their time in the water, of course. One of worse documented attacks where the surfer lived occurred in the Pacifc Northwest. He moved to Hawaii and still surfs -- with scars all over his back!
Anywho, 10 sharks is not a massive kill-off by any means. Consider that against the sanctioned hunting of deer in the Eastern US to stave off deer overpopulation.
-Pie - omnithought, on 10/11/2007, -2/+4Hey, let's endanger the ugly species to save the cute species!
- 8177, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2olddryk (whatever)
Only people living near or vacationing near shark water should be included in that statistic.
Everyone in the midwest should be excluded. That would make it much more accurate. Including someone who has no chance of swimming in the ocean shouldn't erode the accuracy.
I live in Manitoba Canada and vacation very little i have a zero chance of dying from shark.
And never mind about dyin far more eople are injured form shark bites then are killed.
end rant
sorry man i was looking for somebody and it happened to be you.
peace - localzuk, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3We, as a species, intefere with nature far too much. Nature sorts itself out.
- EatingPie, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3We do all the time, and for good results.
Farming is cultivation and control of land use.
Deer hunting, as I mention previously, to control population.
Breeding dogs for specific purposes (Akitas, IIRC, are bred to kill bears, for example).
Fruit "genetically engineered" via tree grafting.
Etc.
We learn about the environment, and we effect it -- for good and ill. I believe it is our responsibility to help species that we can, and it's not wrong by any means.
-Pie - notbrittish788, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1sounds like, life aquatic?
- KingBabi, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3Why don't we just kill off animals based on coolness factor? Seems just as logical to me.
- eirura, on 10/11/2007, -3/+4I'm not that fond of killing some animal just to save another. That's just wrong. I'm sorry but some humans are just plain weird.
- inactive, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2No, I'm all for killing sharks. Sharks are like the rats and pidgeons of the sea. We used to do long line fishing in the south pacific near the waters of Hawaii, and there are SOOO much sharks out there it's ridiculous. There are more sharks than anything else, it seems like. I'm all for killing sharks. Their population #'s bounce back surprisingly well in a few years. Why do you think sharks have been around for millions of years??? A lot longer than humans, or anything else in the sea.
- adolfojp, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2Mmmm.... Tasty tasty sharks!
- ksponge, on 10/11/2007, -3/+4@JimSpaza (#6891168)
It's the people that thought they were super special god mud blobs that brings about things like this in the first place. Yeah, people like you Jim. Thin headed dummies that can't think on their own, again like you Jim. Go look in the mirror. See how thin your head is? Thin head = small brain. See how that works? - duffman03, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1"Hey lets go on a cruise and get government grants for it!"
"Sure, but how?"
"Lets kill some sharks and say we are protecting *****!"
"Yeah dude!" - person, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1If the seals are already struggling to survive, they are weak. What happens if after killing off all the sharks, the seals end up dying anyways? Shouldn't we just let Darwinian theory and evolution play out? The seals may never have meant to survive the sharks, and it would be providing them an unfair advantage by killing the sharks. Humans DONT know all of the impacts on an ecosystem, and so it is incorrect to try to tamper said system.
- alexforcefive, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3Hell, if I have to eat chick peas, then the sharks should too! It's only fair!
- LucidHawk, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1buried : sorry but this is quite mundane; there are much more interesting stories out there that deserve more diggs than this.
- Coinspinner, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1"change is natural?"
Ok, lets change the shark population.
To ZERO. - Coinspinner, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1We are nature.
Killing the sharks is running it's course.
Don't stop at 10. - Coinspinner, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Well aren't humans just the fittest?
- richardhenry, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2I fail to understand what we're thinking here? The seals are endangered, but many species have become extinct naturally. Let it happen - it's stupid of man to assume that as long as we are intelligent, the world needs to stay exactly the same no matter what. Change is natural.
- insanebrain, on 10/11/2007, -8/+8Maybe it's time to kill the scientists.
- Coinspinner, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1"we as a species interfere with nature"
WE ARE NATURE! It's arrogant to think otherwise, we are just another creature on the planet. -
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