By Sonja Fordham
Photograph © Bryan Toro
Today, our blog comes from Sonja Fordham who directed Ocean Conservancy’s shark conservation work from 1991 to 2009. She’s now based just up the block from our DC headquarters, running Shark Advocates International, a non-profit project of The Ocean Foundation. Learn more about Sonja’s work from the Shark Advocates Facebook page and website: www.sharkadvocates.org. Sonja is live-tweeting about Shark Week programming; follow @SharkAdvocates for conservation policy tidbits and ideas for helping sharks of all shapes and sizes.
Shark Week 2017 was off with a bang Sunday night with the much-hyped race between Michael Phelps and a great white shark. As expected, the shark won. But who’s winning in the bigger picture?
The “sharks” (including sawfishes, stingrays, skates, mantas, ratfishes, etc.) make up a reasonably diverse group. Many species can swim faster than a person, but they tend to grow slowly, leaving them ill-equipped to respond quickly to modern day perils.