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You can call me a bleeding heart, I don’t care. Is there any point to catching sharks? I can understand it from a research perspective, but are the sharks then used for their skin or flesh? It’s not catch and release, so what’s the payoff? Please someone enlighten me. —Paingirl
This article appears in Aug 23-29, 2012.
31 Comments
Just as a penis extension for bored twats with more money than imagination Painey. Sorry. >: ( Top tier ocean predators deserve much better.
So long as they are plentiful and thriving…
and their meat is consumed and not wasted, I have less objections to it.
If it’s anything like the Shark Bait documentary, I want to cause many a violent, torturous assault right after I stop throwing up.
I’m not defending the derbies but these guys claim to be a ‘catch, tag and release’ operation and they forward all data collected to the BIO for research.
http://www.bluesharkcharters.com/
Not something I’ve ever tried.
I HAVE done deep sea fishing before and that’s a blast. I have always gone with a reputable charter company that only targets commercial food species like mackerel, pollock, halibut or the occasional cod, and have always taken the fillets for my personal consumption. (i.e. the fish weren’t wasted)
As far as the derbies go, I’m not sure what they do with the sharks caught. (shark steaks maybe??) If they are catching and killing just for the sport of it with no intention of using the meat, etc, then I don’t agree with it. Again, I don’t know the particulars.
I recently asked my vegetarian friend if she gave up meat simply because she thought eating meat was gross or because of how the animals were treated. She said both but mostly because it’s just unnecessary in this day and age and I’d never thought of it like that.
I feel the same way about hunting for sport. I think it’s ridiculous. To the idiots who feel the need to kill things for fun I say do us a favor and start with yourself.
I don’t understand how something that was a means for survival is somehow considered a sport or show of manliness in modern times. If you want a challenge go out into the woods and cut down some trees, plane them into boards and build your own home and furniture, get up at dawn, plant and grow your own food, deliver the babies of your livestock before you pull the trigger on them. I guess it figures the simplest most instantly gratifying practice “point, shoot, kill” would be the only one to survive or be regarded as worthwhile. Any idiot can kill something but it takes a lot more to create something.
Harpoon em all…we’d be better off without em.
I’m assuming your friend then doesn’t wear fur, or use any products containing sheep’s wool, fleece, twee, cashmere, mohair, angora, or down from ducks and geese since…
well we have synthetics now and don’t need to be shaving those poor animals.
Can’t consume anything containing cardamine dye, since it’s made from beetle shells, half the salad dressings are off the table for their egg/fish content….
ya know what, kill me before I get rid of all that.
I’ll gladly die before I give up bacon.
Hey pg, I’m not in the derby, but I do like a nice fat shark steak on the BBQ.
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To me, free range tastes much better than farmed (eggs, chicken, beef, etc).
Wild fish taste better than farmed. Caribou, moose, and venison(wild) beat beef and pork hands down.
Slig anyone? http://fc02.deviantart.com/images3/i/2004/…
Well said, Maideinthe80s.
Maybe you should try this “point, shoot and kill’ practice for youself. You can start by harpooning no_fool.
zZz, remember gummy bears too. A lot of candy has gluten that comes from the ground up cartilage of dead farm animals.
Yes, they eat them if they’re large enough to keep them, except for the blues which are inedible(they pee through their skin, basically). The small fish go back in the water, and are tagged in a program set up with the Bedford Institute. 30 seconds on Google, OP.
Actually if you want to try something that will educate you.
Buy (or go catch your own) shark steak.
Cut it in half, take 1 half & remove the skin, leave the skin on the other half . Cook each piece in a separate pan. whatever oil, onion, butter, spices etc. you do to one piece do the same to the other.
When they are cooked…you will swear they are not from the same fish. The skin (or the layer of fat with the skin) imparts a very strong & IMO not very appealing flavour to the meat.
So if shark is too strong a tasting fish for you …try cooking it with the skin removed.
PS – as a hunter who has watched & photgraphed more animals than I have ever killed, I take exception to the comments about all hunters are out just to blast & kill animals. That isn’t true & most hunters are some of the best resource wild critters have , our license fees pay for wildlife managers & scientists to be able to carry out their duties. Our purchases of equipment provide jobs for those who make the gear, sell the gear & we provide income for guides as well as rural resturants, gas stations & stores, as well camps ,motels etc… a real hunter respects the resource & doesn’t abuse it. That is how you keep the herds healthy & animals plentiful enough to continue the hunt year after year.
Allowing animals to increase in number to levels where their habitat cannot sustain them, will then mean that many will face starvation, disease & die offs. Not good for them, not good for anything. Bamabi is a Disney story & has no basis in Fact so stop confusing your make believe ideas with actual reality of what takes place in the wild.
the more that are caught and killed, the less to eat you in the ocean. how’s that for an answer?
more, you have said exactly what being a true hunter, not sportsman is all about. we take great care not to screw up the area, and leave it the way we found it, minus the kill.
too many fucking yahoos get out there, get drunk, and go wheeling and tearing shit up, just for the fuck of it. to these people i say stay the fuck away. my friends and i use whatever natural surroundings we can find for our blinds and other sit ins.
as to being a vegan, well that is there choice in life, i don’t twist their arms to eat meat,. and not expect them to bug the shit out of me for liking my meat, bacon included.
most of the sharks i saw in the chronically horrid could not eat me
Minus the trail of discarded (lit when tossed) cigarette buts, right BLOW ME? Ya Toolbox!!!
Captain Cunt: “Maybe you should try this “point, shoot and kill’ practice for youself. You can start by harpooning no_fool. Zz, remember gummy bears too. A lot of candy has gluten that comes from the ground up cartilage of dead farm animals.”
Wow, did I insult your mother or something? I thought I was talkin about a shark, you know a big cold-blooded fish. Why are you so hateful with me? I guess you must be pretty protective over your boyfriend Zeddy the teddy. You two should ditch the gummybears & Cap’n crunch, ball up and eat a little cartilidge – you might actually grow some hair on your nuts or even sprout a biscep, ya pathetic little piss-ants!
Excellent post PG. The fact that a full third of oceanic sharks are in rapid decline and that sharks in general are becoming less and less numerous makes Shark derbies just plain stupid. Indeed, what’s the point? Sharks are near the top of the food chain in the ocean and play a hugely important role in maintaining ecosystem health. Haven’t we been complaining about the seal populations? What preys on seals? Clue, s—ks.
I realize this is on the European side but…
http://www.iucn.org/index.cfm?uNewsID=2213
no_fool, we can’t “harpoon em all” because fisheries around the world would collapse.This is for you.
http://www.ohia.org/ohia/roadshows/ocean/t…
It’s no different than deer hunting or fishing salmon or whatever. As long as they are not endangered then fair game.
If they’re eating what they kill, fine.
If it’s just a bunch of Upper-management fucks going out to drink beer, tell titty jokes and get their pictures taken with “a fucken’ big fish” all on the company dime then fuck ’em. Want a thrill big boy – strip to your jock strap and fight the shark mano a mano on his turf.
Or join the army and go to Diarrheastan – now THAT’s a team-building exercise.
Just kidding – any corner office “warrior” it’s ever been my displeasure to know would be about as useful in the military as a feminist sensitivity training seminar. >: )
Whoa, whoa no_fool. Can’t take a joke? Must be that time of the month.
Do you find it odd that you get upset when it’s a person being harpooned, but not when you want to harpoon Every. Single. Shark? How exactly will we be better off without them?
I also didn’t realize talking about gummy bears made me gay with someone. You should probably get your facts straight before having a conversation with anyone from the gay community, lest you insult someone.
not to mention it’s gelatin… not gluten.
The stuff derived from colligen in connective tissues which, once finally broken down when heated, lets the ribs slip off the bone and essentially telling you they’re done to perfection.
don’t worry though, she’s just a homophobe and will get her own comeuppance.
http://www.dolles.com/media/catalog/produc…
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How’s that for an answer
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The sharks caught weren’t “man eaters”, so, that would be a dumb answer.
And was your idea that killing anything that might kill and eat us is a good idea?
Wp
Oops, gelatin*. My bad.
And that, kids, is why you read your comments before posting. To avoid looking like an idiot.
just once you should invest some time in watching a little Shark Week. “man eaters” generally aren’t – it’s their territory we invade, kind of like when we live out in the middle of no where and get pissed cause there’s a bear in the yard.
Sharks are part of the delicate balance of the sea. IF it is a tag and release I would support it. Catching for ‘fun’ is stupid.
agreed funngirl and just because http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_YTJBDUN8iSE/TKu7…
Uh Oh – Now we’re fooked.
Hay Painey, howze the noob?
Yes, Bro Tim, their numbers are declining around the world. For this area, I haven’t the specifics right now other than that there is a general decline in numbers. Another fish in peril is the mighty tuna. We’re getting so too good at catching them (globally speaking) that they are not reaching maturity in great numbers like they once did. Like the shark, the tuna is near the top of the food chain and that is bad news for ecological balance in the ocean.
his tail is longer than he is and he’s hilarious
I’d like to be vegetarian in theory, I don’t know how strict my friend is at the moment but she is planning to go vegan as a new years resolution so I’m guessing she’s pretty disciplined already. I am appalled at the treatment of farmed animals but I don’t have her conviction or maybe I’m just lazy. I care but not enough to make a huge lifestyle change, whatever that makes me I’ll own it. I did start to wonder though if stress is toxic (scientifically proven so I hear) and these animals live depressing stress filled lives what does eating their stress toxin steeped flesh do to us?
80s – Like I siad before, free range is far better than housed farming. It’s the growth hormones that worry me. Have you noticed that it seems that children are starting puberty earlier? growing bigger? fatter?
Whenever I can, I buy my beef from these folks (they bring a truck to HRM on Sundays)
http://www.lindenleas.ca/
Oh, and I absolutely refuse to eat veal…always have, always will.
http://www.freewebs.com/cloudski/photos/Pr…
I loved the Penn & Teller Bullshit segment on Organics. The fucking organic people couldn’t tell which fruit or veggie was organic or normal farming and virtually picked the normal as tasting better than the organic.