Page 3 - Shark Brochure

The Plight

Shark population sizes have decreased
between 70 and 80 percent globally, with some
species such as pelagic porbeagles and oceanic
whitetips facing reductions of 90 and 95 percent.
Many factors play into this mass decline,
including overfishing, bycatch, and culling,
however possibly the greatest threat to sharks is
shark finning. The animals are caught in open
waters and their fins are cut off and sent into the
global fin trade, eventually reaching Asian
markets where demand is high for the delicacy
shark fin soup. One of the reasons why this
“Big and little fish, from the top predators practice is decimating shark populations is
because sharks are being killed faster than they
down to the smallest, we are all can reproduce.
interconnected, all lives matter and we can Their particularly
coexist.” -Andy Casagrande slow reproduction
rates cannot keep
up with 73 million
“My belief is, that once we have uncovered such an sharks a year being
important truth, we have an obligation, no, a duty, Colin Crawford caught and finned,
to do something about it.” -Shawn Heinrichs as they tend to reach full sexual maturity later in
life, their gestation periods are very long, and they
produce only a few pups at a time. This issue is
largely overlooked, however, because many people
are indifferent to whether or not sharks are in the
oceans, or they would rather see sharks gone
because they consider beaches to be safer in
sharkless waters. Yet the fact is that we need sharks
for healthy
oceans and
a healthy
planet. See
the next
panel to
find out
why.

Shawn Heinrichs