The Commission has proposed a rule which would prohibit the practice of feeding marine animals while engaged in diving. Commissioners and staff conducted a workshop on July 25 to hear additional presentations from interests who support and oppose the proposed rule. The Commission is interested in developing a complete understanding of this issue before proceeding to any final action.

The major issues from proponents include the economic and educational benefits of the practice; the safety record of the Bahamas and other places where the activity occurs; and, the lack of regulation of spear fishing (another dangerous fish attracting activity). The major issues from opponents include the safety of participant and nonparticipant divers, surfers, and swimmers; concern about the activity in multiple use areas; the effects of concentrating and training shark to expect food; and, it is inconsistent with policies for terrestrial predators.

Testimony presented during the workshop suggested three alternative courses of action for Commission consideration.

1. No action - The Commission would monitor the activity to determine the extent and location of private and commercial feeding operations.

2. Area Designation - The Commission would hold additional workshops to designate areas where feeding could occur, establish reasonable buffer zones, promote industry standards for feeding methods and participant protection, and limit competing fishing activities during feeding season.

3. Prohibition - The Commission would continue with rulemaking to prohibit the feeding of sharks and reef fish by divers.

Introduction

The controversy in Broward County over the practice of feeding sharks to attract numbers of animals to divers during the course of head boat dive tours is now a proposed statewide feeding ban. A fact-finding workshop on the issue was held on October 29, 1999. The subsequent February Commission meeting in Jacksonville, included a presentation of the October workshop summary, the staff recommendation, and public testimony. The Commission voted to develop a rule which would prohibit the feeding of reef fishes and sharks, not to include chumming. So, regardless of the original source of the conflict between user groups, major national organizations are now involved both in support and opposition to a state wide ban. The Commission has also received dozens of letters and thousands of petition signatures and email communications in support of and in opposition to the proposal to prohibit this activity.

Background

Dive tour operators in the Bahamas, the Cayman Islands, and other diving locations world wide have been offering excursions that include observing the feeding of sharks and other marine animals. During the workshop, panelists stated that feeding dives have grown to account for the majority of dive trips in both the Bahamas (sharks) and Cayman (sting ray) islands. So, the activity is now considered to be economically critical to those countries. There have been less than a dozen verified instances of sharks or barracudas biting divers in this time, and all such interactions have been non-lethal and primarily involve the feeder. However the feeding practice is clearly derived from conditioning techniques and there have been many modifications of feeding practices, by industry, to minimize danger to employees. Governments have also become involved; establishing permit systems to participate, promulgating feeding guidelines, and even prohibiting divers from feeding activities in multiple use areas. However a hallmark of the industry is a lack of consistent guidelines.

In Florida, feeding dives are done both commercially ( by for hire head boats) and by private divers. Caribbean reef sharks, black tips, bull shark, nurse sharks, and bonnet head sharks have been targeted in Florida. Other animals include moray eels, sting rays, and barracuda, tropical fish and other reef fishes. Workshop testimony indicates that nurse sharks are the only shark species currently targeted to aggregate by feeding.

Most dive charter operations in Florida do not conduct feeding tours. Predator feeding dive tours have been conducted sporadically over the last six years in Broward County and currently include three businesses. We have discovered no publicized feeding activity in Dade County.

Fish feeding dive and snorkel tours have been going on in the Florida Keys for at least 20 years in Key Largo. There is another dive boat operator advertising shark feeding, located in Marathon. These tours focus on feeding and attracting sharks and a variety of reef fishes, including ornamentals, snapper, grouper, barracuda, moray eels, and sting rays. While other dive operators may occasionally engage in feeding it is not yet an integral part of their current business activity. So in Florida the activity is not yet widespread. An exception to this is the feeding that occurs at most large aquaria that are open to the public.

Apparently six or fewer dive charter operations are involved. The number was not called into question during either the October 1999 or the July 2000 workshop after drafts of this paper were distributed. The idea of no more than six operations statewide was repeatedly voiced during the July workshop and the total areas involved were, " no larger than a football field" and " no larger than this (meeting) room". While only three operations do feeding tours in Broward County waters, I interviewed one charter dive boat captain who does tag along trips, following the head boats so his charter may participate. A ship sunk as an artificial reef, the Sea Emperor, appears to be a primary location for conducting these dives. Other dives focusing on the feeding of nurse sharks are conducted on a portion of the inner reef tract (the Pompano Mooring Buoys), two hundred yards offshore of the beach. Apparently the practice of fish feeding is also popular with private, recreational divers.

Options and Review

The activity is not wide spread in Florida at this time. There is no definitive evidence that the feeding of sharks and other marine animals is having a negative impact on the health and abundance of the resource or is seriously altering behavior and increasing risks to divers, swimmers, and surfers. However given the economic benefits to the Southeast Florida coast from providing water-related activities even the perception of a problem is a problem. The Peterson Field Guide to Atlantic Coast Fishes identifies dangerous fishes to include both poisonous fishes and those which attack man to include, some sharks, the Great Barracuda, and also certain moray eels when provoked or when feeding. Though infrequent, nurse sharks do attack people, the latest was near Bahia Honda during the first day of the lobster sport season this year and another occurred near Bradenton during July 1999.

We are also concerned that the activity occurs in open nearshore waters in multiple use areas where safety conflicts among divers, spear fishermen, and hook and line fishermen already exist. A report from an observer, in pertinent part, is particularly telling:

In the Bahamas, where unprotected dive-with-sharks operations developed quickly as a tourist draw, more than a dozen injuries have occurred in the last several years, at least two quite serious. Most were not publicized because of efficient damage control by local operators. Perhaps fortunately for the operators, most victims were host dive masters, but a serious injury to a diving tourist is inevitable. Last year I took part in an unprotected Bahamas feeding dive to view its design and safety. The experience was exhilarating. An aggregation of about 50 sharks (blacktip Carcharhinus limbatus, Caribbean reef C. perezi, and nurse Ginglymostoma cirratum) were attracted to a frozen fish 'chum ball' at a site utilized continuously (3-4 times a week) for several years. Hundreds (thousands?) of bony fishes were similarly attracted. I did not feel threatened by the sharks swimming above and around me as we knelt on the sand bottom of a natural 'amphitheatre.' I did note one blacktip, apparently low in a dominance order, confined to the perimeter of the circling mass of fishes and reluctant to approach the central chum ball. It exhibited apparent displacement or frustration behavior: periodic mouth gaping, increasing over time, and occasional erratic swimming movements, including back hunching and pectoral fin dropping. This type of behavior has been observed immediately prior to attacks on divers at other Bahamas shark feeding dive sites, and is similar to gray reef shark behavior observed by Nelson et al. (1986) in the Pacific.

An unanswered question is whether individual bait-entrained sharks are more or less dangerous to humans than their wild peers. Observations of feeding reef sharks in the Bahamas, which largely ignore divers, could suggest 'no more' or even 'less' of a threat. However, shark attack rate is profoundly influenced by the concentrations of sharks and humans occupying the water at the same time. Increases in either generally result in an increased probability of an attack. Obviously, high concentrations of both sharks and humans are found together in a small area in baited-shark dives. It is also clear that sharks attracted to bait are in a heightened state of excitement, some approaching or achieving frenzy. In addition, the unnaturally high concentrations of sharks pursuing a limited resource (the bait) may lead to increases in density-dependent agonistic behavioral displays (see box above) and increased likelihood of attack. Furthermore, we do not know how the food-conditioned sharks behave when the free food stops. Recently a documented attack occurred on a diver swimming at a Bahamas feeding site on a non-feeding day.

Ecotourism dives aside, shark attacks on humans are rare. Nevertheless, shark attack still is of great interest and concern to the public. The ISAF routinely provides advice on how to reduce the already tiny chance of attack. It is ironic that shark-feeding dives freely violate several of the axioms of conventional wisdom advocated by virtually all attack researchers (see box above). That more than two dozen reported attacks have occurred worldwide during shark feeding comes as no surprise to those who study shark attack.(George H. Burgess. Diving with elasmobranchs: a call for restraint. Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida)

Scientists consulted on this issue were divided in their opinions. Concern included that the feeding might have impacts on the trophic relationships in and around reef communities, due to both the feeding of and the aggregation and absence sharks, while others believed any such impacts would be minimal. Similarly, opinions were divided on whether shark behavior would be altered in areas adjacent to the feeding sites. There seems to be agreement on the idea that frequent feeding in discrete locations would likely cause sharks and other predators to be less afraid of human divers and even to anticipate that food would accompany them. One of the points raised during the July workshop was that dolphin research shows that feeding these mammals changes their behavior, endangers the dolphin, and endangers people; the NMFS researcher expects similar conclusions if fish feeding was formally studied.

Regulations Elsewhere

Another issue raised during the workshop is the effect of our regulations on the practice in other countries. An obvious corollary is, how is the practice regulated in other states and countries? We did our own research into the activity in Australia, Hawaii, and California. The practice does not seem to be prevalent in other Gulf of Mexico states and there are no regulations. In North Carolina there are shark excursions but the activity appears to be opportunistic in the sense that natural aggregations of shark exist at wreck sites. Feeding fish as opposed to using bait to catch fish is prohibited in Biscayne National Park and Everglades National Park. Within the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary there is education and sanction to prevent any feeding not associated with fishing activities.

The regulation of feeding activities in a broad sense is done by operators, who may or may not use shark cages for viewing, who may or may not hand feed, who may or may not allow passengers to engage in feeding, who may or may not separate observers from the immediate feeding area, who may or may not use chain mail armor to protect feeders or other participants. A common thread is liability concern. Blanket insurance policies for charter operators both include and specifically exclude coverage. The use of a waiver form, in addition to the standard dive waiver form is required for shark feeding participants.

The State of Hawaii has feeding regulations in place to prohibit feeding in numerous areas. The regulation is based on the type of area management. In one area a company that takes tourists on submarine rides created an artificial reef area, to avoid damage to a natural reef area when the subs touch down. To speed up the fish attraction process the reef was heavily baited with food that attracted both sharks and other marine fishes. The practice was prohibited in the area due to concerns from surfers. Feeding is prohibited by regulation in sixteen (16) other areas. Feeds such as bread and corn were extensively used so that water quality was compromised and the moray eel population became so aggressive that an ongoing census and relocation program now exists.

Area regulations include the following prohibitions:

1. To introduce any food or other substance into the water to feed or attract marine life.

2. To feed or introduce any food material, substance, or device as an attractant, directly to, or in the vicinity of any aquatic organism except for the purpose of catching and removing that organism, as permitted.

3. To engage in fish feeding within the ZONES, except for opelu fishing.

4. To engage or attempt to engage in fish feeding

The State of California

There are two types of feeding dives. One for white sharks and one for blue sharks. The white shark dive was based on chumming from a boat then lowering divers in a shark cage for observation. This occurred in the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary during the season when white sharks gather around seal rookeries. Low visibility required chumming to further concentrate the sharks. Divers were then lowered, in shark cages, over the side of the vessel. Sanctuary enforcement used the general, "no dumping except in association with a fishing operation", to block the practice but ultimately adopted a specific rule to prohibit the activity. The other shark diving activity is to view blue shark. These animals commonly occur only in the deep waters, of the EEZ, so are not regulated by the State.

Australia has areas that are designated for fish feeding activities. Within the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park and World Heritage Area, shark feeding is not allowed nor is it recommended outside the Park. The feeding of other fish is permissible. This was decided many years ago. Current administrators express concern about allowing a circus animal concept within the Heritage Area areas and are moving to further restrict the activity. Where feeding is allowed is determined by use zones. For example there are zones in the park where cruise ships may engage in feeding activities. Many tourist dive operators engage in feeding during dive tours subject to permit conditions. One condition, more of a caveat, is that feeding may result in undesirably aggressive behavior...and can be dangerous to the person feeding the fish or others close by in the water. Other guidelines include that feeding should only be conducted by staff, avoid feeding where fishing takes place, feed by throwing into the water not by hand, people should not be in the water at the time of feeding, and feed only raw marine products or fish pellets.

Country-wide, we have not been able to get a definitive answer about feeding but suspect it is unregulated. There is a plan for the recovery of the grey nurse shark, akin to our sand tiger, which is a listed species there. One of the threats is ecotourism because,

Interactions between divers and grey nurse sharks were once very common. The grey nurse shark is a big attraction to SCUBA divers and increasing pressure has been placed on operators to take divers to places where they can encounter this shark....shark viewing operations at popular sites may deter site-attached populations from residing in the area.

The development of a code of conduct for commercial operators and dive clubs is recommended.

Top of page

Our mission: Managing fish and wildlife resources for their long-term well-being and the benefit of people.