Rookery Bay National Estuarine Research and Jeff Corwin

NAPLES  -- Shark research at the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) Rookery Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR) will have the national spotlight tomorrow in a segment of Ocean Mysteries with Jeff Corwin. The new production, launched jointly by the Georgia Aquarium and Litton Entertainment, is part of the Litton Weekend Adventure Saturday morning three-hour educational programming block on ABC. The shark research episode, featuring RBNERR’s fisheries biologist Pat O’Donnell, along with Mike Hyatt and Paul Anderson, PhD., two of the other researchers involved in the study, is scheduled to air tomorrow Saturday, Nov. 5.

“We are thrilled that the Rookery Bay is being recognized in this production,” said Rookery Bay NERR Manager Gary Lytton. “Millions of TV viewers nationwide will have a great opportunity to learn more about sharks and the importance of mangrove estuaries as shark nurseries through our collaboration with Corwin and the Georgia Aquarium.” 

Five years ago, Rookery Bay NERR’s long-term shark monitoring program caught the attention of Florida Aquarium veterinary staff working to improve captive shark handling techniques. Subsequently, Rookery Bay NERR entered into a cooperative research effort with the Florida Aquarium, the Georgia Aquarium and Shedd’s Aquarium in Chicago. The collaborative shark stress response project required access to wild-caught sharks, such as those encountered monthly in RBNERR’s project.

As production plans got underway at the Georgia Aquarium for Ocean Mysteries, the Rookery Bay shark capture project became the perfect opportunity to put Corwin in close contact with wild sharks. Filming took place aboard a Rookery Bay NERR research vessel in the Ten Thousand Islands in August 2011. The crew encountered four sharks:  two lemon (Negaprion brevirostris), a bonnethead (Sphyrna tiburo) and a blacktip (Carcharhinus limbatus). While the cameras rolled, the sharks were measured, weighed and had other data recorded before being tagged and released with Corwin’s assistance and enthusiastic explanation of their significance to the ocean ecosystem.

Programming times vary during the Saturday morning Litton’s Weekend Adventure on ABC. Check your local listings.

RTSea Productions Using Shark Footage for Great Shark Media

Meeting at the intersection of responsible shark media and great visuals is this news piece from ABC. Kudos to Richard Theiss from RTSea Productions who has been a tireless pro-shark media campaigner with many years of shark footage for use by the media that portrays these animals in this most natural light.

This white shark footage is from Isla Guadalupe shot with the crew of Shark Diver. Richard will be back at the island again this season (2011) for more shark encounters:

Gulf of the Farallones Junior on Tape - ABC News Report

While many within the research blogging community have completely exonerated Dr.Michael Domeier and Chris Fischer for the current condition of Junior, a shark with 2.6 pounds of rusting hook left in his esophagus, ABC News just completed an investigation of the events that most likely lead to this animals current condition.

While the exoneration has proposed that a shark attack, not a rusting hook, is responsible for the condition of this animal we are not buying it. We are also not buying into the notion that just because this animal is "still tracking" means this effort was a success. The animals current condition is grave, this is not the same once robust shark, and the debate about it's condition and ultimate responsibility needs to be addressed clearly and without any further internecine agendas by ridiculous bit players in California.

What is not up for debate is the half-assed attempt by one or more within the shark research community to discredit Dr. Domeier for the wound on the side of this animals face. It was a sorry side show to the animals overall diminished condition and frankly a disservice to a protected species within a national marine sanctuary where new prohibitive regulations keep all persons 164 feet away from white sharks at all times.

The ABC News investigation used clips from the show as Junior was caught and details the 1.2 hours this animal spent in the care of a team of self-styled shark tagging experts who, by all accounts, were learning as they went along, reacting to an unfolding series of cascading disasters with "televised precision".

Watch Chris Fischer the owner of Fischer Productions and one of the shows crew members, as he realizes that they are in the middle of a disaster with cameras running celebrate the eye of the hook coming free from Junior after heavy duty bolt cutters are pushed through the gills, yelling "Super Sweet!".

Super Sweet? This animal is being left with a huge foreign body inside it's throat, and yet the crew seems to think this is cause for celebration, it was anything but. The shows cast members also renamed the shark to "Lucky", a purely fictionalized attempt at audience redirect.

Moments like these are the reason why this brand of research, using film crews for science, should not be allowed back at the Farallones. It is also the reason why Sanctuary Manager Maria Brown who refused to be interviewed by ABC for this piece, should be fired from her post and replaced by a manager who is less star struck, and more interested in long term non invasive work with a protected species.

Maria's handling and media appearances over this event have been poor at best, at worst actionable by NOAA.

It shatters the imagination that this is the same Maria Brown who shepherded in the new rules and regulations that keep visitors to sanctuary waters 164 feet away from white sharks. Yet within months of those new rules granted this well heeled, for profit film crew, who also had thousands of dollars in promotional product placement agreements with companies like Costa Sunglasses, unprecedented access to the these same animals with baited hooks.

This month Maria Brown continues to consider a return by Dr.Domeier's team to hook 11 more sharks within Sanctuary waters, playing politics once again, when the debate over the condition of Junior has not even been discussed with any serious thought and more than a healthy dose of career saving cover your ass.