chapter 8 



Shark Treasures 



The sharks are there— uncountable mil- 

 lions of them— for any maritime coun- 

 try whose people will eat shark and whose fishermen will catch them. 

 But the hunting of sharks is a frustrating, hazardous, and usually not 

 too profitable enterprise. And the capture of a shark can be an exploit— 

 the duel of a solitary man in a rowboat against a thrashing, maddened 

 shark often bigger than he or his boat. 



Sometimes shark-hunting methods are downright incredible. Around 

 the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean, a crude shark fishery has been built 

 up. A six-week expedition in Seychelles waters has brought in 170 tons 

 of sharks. 



Aboard some of the boats, the fishermen depend on "shark callers"— 

 sea-going, self-proclaimed sorcerers. A shark caller drums his feet in a 

 wild tattoo on the deckboards of the pirogue, then slaps the surface of 

 the water with one hand and the hull with the other. Finally, he lets 

 out a loud, spine-tingling wail. Fishermen swear that the antics of the 

 shark caller do bring in sharks. 



Perhaps the fishermen of the Seychelles have found, at last, a socially 

 useful purpose for rock 'n' roll troubadours. But they haven't found a 

 way to make shark-catching commercially profitable. Only time, pa- 

 tience, and some kind of government subsidy could do that. William 

 Travis, an entrepreneur of shark fishing in the Seychelles, gave it up 

 after two years. The logistics of commercial fishing called for more 

 money than he had. Like many shark hunters, he managed to salvage 

 an interesting book (Shark for Sale)^ out of the debris of his failure. He 

 earned little else from sharks, however. 



If all the many by-products of the shark are tapped; if markets are 

 developed for all of these by-products; if modern methods of catching, 

 preserving, and utilizing these products are employed— then, and only 

 then, can a shark industry be made profitable. On paper, at least, these 

 profits are possible. A U.S. Fish and Wildlife study showed that $15 

 to 120 could be earned on a good-sized shark, if it were utilized as 

 thoroughly as the meat industry utilizes pigs or cattle. The study esti- 



^ William Travis, Shark for Sale (London: George Allen & Unwin, Ltd., 1961). 



179 



