Stop Bad Mouthing Sharks

Shark attacks are something many people fear when they go to the beach, surf, or scuba dive. The fear of the large jaws with multiple rows of teeth which can easily bite off a limb swarms the minds of people. Many might believe that sharks are out to get humans just like many movies show. Jaws was the kickstart to this fear. The four-movie series movie has the shark coming back to attach again and again. Sharks are marine animals which travel thousands of miles each year. The Great White Shark is even said to travel up to 50 miles per day. It’s very rare for a shark to attack again as they are continously moving. Most sharks cannot stop moving or they would die. If they do not have water moving through their gills they are unable to breath.

The majority of shark attacks occur in North America, Australia, and South Africa. Shark attacks do not always occur in areas where sharks are most densely populated. The majority of the time, they occur in areas where sharks have lost their habitat and are forced to interact with humans. Most sharks, like other wild animals, prefer to avoid humans if at all possible.

This want to hide away from humans causes shark attacks to be extremely rare. Most shark attacks are due to some provocation from humans. In fact, there are only ever 70 sharks attack each year worldwide and only 3-4 of them are fatal. We kill far more sharks than they do humans.

Shark attacks are motivated by a variety of factors. The reason sharks attack is usually determined by the species, the human's activity, and the location of the attack.

People are careless or foolish

Many shark attacks will occur due to a human’s carelessness or foolishness. People may try to touch these immense creatures or end up accidentally stepping on one.

Sharks are curious

Just like we humans, we touch things when we are unsure about something. Sharks, unforntally for those who are bitten, do not have limbs of their own to be able to reach out and feel something. Instead, they simply take a bite in order to find out what it is. Yes this may cause people to lose limbs, but this is simply the way they function. Sharks' mouths also serve as finely tuned sensory organs, causing them to "mouth" unfamiliar objects in order to examine them and determine their potential food value. Their gums and slightly mobile teeth are so sensitive that it has been suggested that they can predict the fat content of a potential prey item. Humans have much lower BMIs than seals and sea lions.

Mistaken Idenity

A shark can detect a person in the ocean long before the person detects a shark. White sharks have acute hearing and vision. They have the ability to detect sound and smells from hundreds of meters away. They can detect moving objects via their lateral line, which is made up of pressure-sensitive receptors that run the length of their body, and their underwater vision is far superior to ours. However, as impressive as these senses are, they are not without flaws. Many attacks occur when water conditions are poor, prompting many scientists to believe that poor visibility, background noise from heavy surf, and other factors can lead white sharks to mistake humans for their normal prey.

Sharks are territorial

White sharks defend their 'personal space' by body posturing and biting, and the less dominant shark is usually forced to yield to the more dominant. A surfer or swimmer on the surface, completely unaware of a shark's presence beneath the water, would be completely unaware of a shark defending its territory until bitten. When there are fish or other prey in the water, a shark may view a person as a competitor.

There are many other theories to the reasons sharks will bite people, but you shouldn’t be afraid of them. Most of the time they want to avoid you as much as you want to avoid them. It is far easier to get stung by a jellyfish than bit by a shark.