A series of high-profile shark attacks this summer — from the waters off Long Island to the beaches of Florida — may have fueled some vacation panic, but marine biologists point out that having more sharp-toothed creatures close to shore proves that conservation efforts are paying off.
Clean bays, estuaries and beaches aren’t irresistible just for humans; they’re better for the schools of fish and other sea creatures that serve as the main food sources of sharks and other predators. If their next meal is closer to shore, the sharks follow — creating more potentially dangerous, if statistically rare, interactions.
“I would argue there is a greater benefit of having sharks along our beaches,” shark expert Chris Lowe said. “We know the ecological importance of these animals, and we know they’re good indicators of ocean health.”
For much of the 20th century, shark populations declined because of overfishing and pollution. Since the 1990s, improvements in fisheries management and tighter environmental standards have boosted the population of sharks and the fish they eat. That combination is likely the root of more shark sightings, Mr. Lowe and other experts say.
That can be bad news for swimmers and surfers, but it is probably a good sign for the oceans. The great whites, hammerheads, thresher and tiger sharks are vital to keeping the ecosystem in balance.
The oddity of this summer isn’t that a few dozen people have been bitten, but rather the locations of the encounters.
Most shark bites in the U.S. are along the coast of Florida. This summer, Long Island, New York, has had an unprecedented spate of shark attacks.
Six shark attacks were reported last month at Long Island beaches. Although none led to serious injuries, the puzzling string of shark bites has unnerved beachgoers. Long Islanders and beachgoers on other coasts are wondering whether it is the start of a trend.
Christopher Paparo, manager of the Marine Science Center at Long Island’s Stony Brook University in Southampton, said in a backgrounder video that conservation and environmental efforts in the New York City area are in large part responsible for the rise in shark incidents.
“In recent years, we’ve been seeing far more shark sightings in the waters surrounding Long Island, and that’s a good thing,” Mr. Paparo said. “We’re seeing more sharks because our environment is much healthier and the populations are much stronger due to conservation.”
A healthy diet
Shark attacks have the same effect every summer: panic about the safety of going into the ocean. The experts agree that sharks don’t want to eat people. If they did, that would be a problem.
“If sharks were seeking out people, we’d have about 10,000 bites a day,” shark expert Gavin Naylor said. “There’d be carnage. So the fact that there’s so very few bites, it means that sharks are doing their damndest to avoid us.”
Mr. Lowe, a marine biology professor and director of the shark lab at California State University, Long Beach, said a shark might bite a swimmer because it feels threatened or mistakes the person for food. Otherwise, they think humans are unimportant “floating objects at the surface,” Mr. Lowe said.
In fact, far more sharks are in the water near swimmers than most people are aware.
“Any given day in Southern California, there are probably a couple dozen human-white shark interactions where the people at the beach don’t even know they’re there,” said Mr. Lowe, whose lab conducts drone studies to determine how often a shark is in proximity to a swimmer. “If you look at the rate of encounter and the rate of bites, the risk is very low.”
The number of sharks close to shore has increased, thanks in part to conservation efforts since the 1990s.
A 2019 bill that the New York State Legislature passed unanimously also could be playing a major role. The bill outlawed the capture of Atlantic menhaden — known locally as bunker — with drawstring fishing nets after overfishing decimated its population a decade ago. In the three years since, the population of bunker has surged, giving sharks more prey to eat close to shore.
Sharks feeding on other ocean creatures can make beaches safer.
In Southern California, the juvenile white sharks feed on stingrays, which number in the millions and are more likely to injure swimmers than any other marine animal, Mr. Lowe said.
Plentiful meals for sharks could help the fishing industry, too.
At beaches on the northern part of the East Coast, the gray seal population has grown. Mr. Lowe said that could pose a threat to commercial fishing if left unchecked because seals eat a wide range of fish such as cod and haddock. Having sharks nearby to feed on the seals can reduce the population naturally and increase fishing returns.
Climate change might be playing a role, although research is far from conclusive.
Mr. Naylor, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research at the Florida Museum of Natural History, said climate change has many “nonlinear consequences,” but whether one is that more sharks are near the shore is far from conclusive. Warmer waters can change the types of sharks at beaches, but it doesn’t necessarily mean more sharks, the experts said.
At the very least, warmer temperatures are likely to attract more people to beaches during the dog days of summer. With more people in the water, “the probability of a bite goes up,” Mr. Lowe said.
Summer of the shark
Even with the half-dozen incidents on Long Island this summer, the chances of being bitten by a shark are infinitesimal.
“It’s Powerball-winning rare,” Mr. Lowe said.
The U.S. has had 32 unprovoked shark bites this year as of Thursday, according to Tracking Sharks. None of them has been fatal.
Authorities say the total number of worldwide shark bites this year is on pace with previous years. In that way, sharks are minding their own business as they normally do.
Still, the series of attacks on Long Island does make this summer different — at least for New Yorkers. Before this year, only 12 unprovoked shark bites had been recorded in New York’s history, according to the International Shark Attack File.
The first was on June 30 when a 57-year-old man sustained a laceration on his foot at Jones Beach. Three days later, a lifeguard was bitten at a different beach during a training exercise. Another lifeguard had a similar encounter four days after that during a training session.
A week later, two men were nipped in the calf by sharks on the same day. In the latest attack, on July 20, a shark chomped into the foot of a teenage surfer, leaving a 4-inch cut.
Most of the injuries were minor but required medical care and some stitches.
Still, shark bites can have dire consequences.
A teenager was seriously injured by a 9-foot shark at a beach in Tallahassee, Florida, in early July. She later needed an amputation. In June, a 62-year-old man in California spent three weeks in a hospital after sustaining major injuries to his midsection in a shark attack.
The attacks, as well as an increase in sightings, have led beaches from Cape Cod to Miami to boost their shark patrols. Rockaway Beach in New York and Horseneck Beach in Massachusetts have even closed on days when sharks are spotted.
Luck of the draw
A cluster of shark encounters in one area might seem abnormal, but that’s not how Mr. Naylor sees it. “Every year, there’s a different part of the world where the shark’s food source is close in to shore,” he said. “A couple of years ago, it was New Caledonia. Before then, it was Reunion off the Indian Ocean. Often, it’s Western Australia with white sharks.”
Mr. Naylor said he can’t predict the future, but the string of attacks this year isn’t likely to be a new normal at Long Island beaches.
“We might see a spate with shark bites and then none at all,” Mr. Naylor said. “If you tell someone in Long Island that it’s nothing unusual, they’ll say, ’Au contraire, it’s very different.’ That’s because they’re looking at the problem locally and looking at this in rapid succession.”
From 2012 to 2019, the average number of unprovoked shark bites around the world each year was 79, according to the International Shark Attack File. Ten or fewer people have died from shark attacks every year since 2012. The annual average of fatalities was five before the pandemic. The number of unprovoked bites around the world was 57 in 2020 and 73 last year. Researchers say COVID-19 may have affected the number of beachgoers. About 60% of shark attacks in the U.S. are along the coast of Florida.
According to the International Shark Attack File, the risk of dying from a shark attack in the U.S. is more than 1 in 4.3 million — compared with a 1 in approximately 79,000 chance of dying from a lightning strike. Rip currents, which killed an annual average of 36 people worldwide from 2004 to 2013, are much more dangerous than sharks. Drowning remains the largest risk for swimmers. Nearly 4,000 people in the U.S. die from drowning every year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“The question comes down to risk,” Mr. Lowe said. “Your safety isn’t guaranteed, but you have a higher chance of drowning at a beach.”
• Jacob Calvin Meyer can be reached at jmeyer@washingtontimes.com.
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