Discovery Channel’s Shark Week never fails to inspire a wave of comments concerning shark encounters. On one hand they do a good job making a case for sharks being an important link to the oceans food chain, and also pointing out the need to conserve and protect these valuable pelagics. On the other hand, they do occasionally over-dramatize the threat of sharks to humans. Case in point was the segment entitled Terror On Fire Island. It concerned two encounters – notice I did not say shark attacks – on Fire Island last summer where a pair of youngsters suffered minor wounds from what apparently were sand tigers. These encounters happened on the same day, approximately four miles apart. The show entertained the possibility of it being one rogue shark prowling the waters of Fire Island and threatening beach goers. Now of course it had to be upsetting to the youngsters involved and their parents, but interspersing shots of great whites slicing through the water was a bit overdone.
Overall, I found the segment laughable, but in true Discovery Channel fashion, there were some interesting conclusions drawn from these incidents, such as Great South Bay becoming a nursery ground for sand tigers, and that these incidents were the result of small, young sand tigers “testing” sources of food, which is a far cry from a shark attacking a human. We’ve known for many years that Great South Bay serves as a nursery ground for sandbar sharks, and sharks have been cruising the waters around Long Island my entire life without any reported shark attacks. I have seen a great white less than 200 yards off the beach between Gilgo and Tobay. I once tried to bait an estimated 400-pound mako that was feeding on a school of small bluefish east of the Fire Island Coast Guard Station inside Great South Bay, and watched six to eight foot sharks moving under the lights off of the station’s dock. And there have been a number of incidents over the years where surfcasters in Montauk have had sharks go after fish on their stringers.
Yes, the sharks have always been there, but the reality is that the number of sharks in our waters has increased dramatically. Federal regulations protecting sandbar (brown) sharks and sand tigers have no doubt contributed to the increase. Surf fishermen have been relying on bunker chunks to catch bass and blues during the summer doldrums for as long as I can remember. Hooking a shark, excluding dogfish and sand sharks, was a rarity until the last few seasons. Last summer, I was getting reports of as many as a dozen sharks hooked in one night by some casters. Most are sand tigers and sandbars, but there have been small threshers and makos beached as well. The protected status of these sharks means they cannot be targeted, but anglers hoping for a bass or blue cannot avoid hooking them. As a result, they have beefed up their terminal tackle to avoid the frequent bite-offs from sharks. If you do hook and land one of these sharks, do not remove it from the water. The best practice is to cut the leader and let the shark swim off. Their strong digestive juices will make short work of the hook. You should avoid using stainless hooks for any chunking you do during the summer months, and I’d recommend using only non-offset circle hooks for all your bait fishing. The safest way to remove a hook from a shark is with a long handled hook disgorger.
Sand tigers and sandbars are not the only sharks on the increase along our shores. The East End of the Island has been identified as a nursing ground for great whites and numerous pups weighing 300 to 600 pounds have been recorded in Montauk’s near shore waters the past couple of years. The rapidly expanding seal population at the point has resulted in an increased number of great whites prowling East End waters. That should be of far greater concern than the large numbers of sandbar and sand tigers cruising the Island’s western beaches. Just two weekends ago, John Bruno had an estimated 50-inch striper bitten in half while perched on a south side rock. Another caster reported a couple of 10 to 12 footers cruising the shoreline, while another surfcaster beat off an aggressive 7 footer with his rod butt. Yes – they prefer fish and seals but mistakes happen. Given that, I’d think twice about skishing or swimming out to distant rocks in a wetsuit at night.
