ADOPT A MARINE ANIMAL

Adopt a marine animal...
It can be a great gift as well!!

United Kingdom (Adopt a dolphin)

Adopt a whale

Adopt an Orca (Killerwhale)

Adopt a Grey Nurse Shark

Adopt a Great White Shark

Adopt- Basking Shark (Basking Bunch)

Adopt a marine turtle

GREAT WHITE... A MISUNDERSTANDING

Many people have a big fear of sharks, especially Great Whites. A lot of this comes from movies like Jaws - which is based on a number of attacks that really happened in New Jersey in 1916. Some people think that there are tons of sharks waiting to eat them if they venture out into the ocean, which is simply not true. Sharks rarely ever eat humans and are solitary animals. They either travel alone or in groups of two.

Shark attacks are quite rare, in the US there are two to three non-fatal attacks on swimmers, surfers, and divers per year. By the number of reported incidents, Dogs kill more people each year than Great Whites have killed in the last 100 years. There are lots of divers who swim with sharks and are not attacked. In fact, there are places where you can be guided on a dive with sharks after just one dive lesson. They get used to people and get quite tame. Sharks are misunderstood animals.

Kingdom Animalia
Plylum Chordata SubPhylum Vertebrata
Class Chrondrichthyes SubClass Elasmobranchii
Order Lamniformes
Family Lamnidae
Genus Carchardon
Species carcharias

One species of the shark clan is the great white shark that swims around the coastal regions of the all the oceans. These sharks are also known as white pointer, white death, as well as white shark. The scientific name of this shark species is Carcharodon carcharias.
The white sharks are the largest predatory fish in the world. It is the only species of the genus Carcharodon that has survived the ravages of time. The rest of the species have gone into extinction.

The great white sharks are extremely sensitive to the electrical field emitted by the movement of living creatures. Their sensitivity is due to the extra sense that was given by the Ampullae of Lorenzini. The sharks are so sensitive that they can perceive half a billionth of a volt.

Sharks are important predators in the marine ecosystem. Their favorite prey are seals and sea lions. As juveniles they eat fish, and rays. When they become full grown they eat marine animals such as whales, seals, dolphins, large tuna fish, sea otters, and dead animals that they find floating on the surface. In order to catch its food a shark will go along the sea bottom and look for shapes at the surface. If it sees something similar to the shape of a seal they charge full speed. They ram the prey and give it a first bite all in one motion, which stuns and injures the prey. It then disappears and allows the prey to bleed to death. When it’s certain the prey’s dead it begins to feed. Sharks don’t chew their food, they just rip it into mouth-sized pieces and swallow it whole. A big meal can last a shark up to two months.

These sharks are ovoniparous, they give birth to 2-14 fully formed pups which are up to 1.5m (5ft) long. Fertilization of the eggs occurs in the female, and later the eggs actually hatch within the female. The young are nourished by eating unfertilized eggs and smaller siblings in the womb. There is no placenta with which they can get nourishment from their mother; they must fend for themselves. The female gives birth to live young, unlike many other sharks who lay eggs. The newborn gets no help from its mother. As soon as it’s born it swims away to begin living its life. A newborn is about 4ft long, and it grows 25cm (10inches) each year, reaching maturity at 10 years.

SHARK ATTACKS???

Great white sharks don't normally attack human beings unless provoked or human have been mistaken for food. During dawn is when the sharks come out to feed and sometimes they feed in musky waters. Surfers on their surf board looks like turtles from below and the sharks favourite food are turtles and seals.

Therefore to avoid being eaten by sharks:

• Don't go into open waters during shark feeding time as they go frenzy
• Don't go into open waters if you are hurt and have a wound, sharks can smell blood from quite far away
• Don't go into open waters with your pet

Most of the surfers themselves know the risk they are taking when they go out surfing and they respect that they are the intruders and not the other way round, so why can't other people understand that? The percentage of people killed by car accidents, suicide and all sorts of other domestic accidents is a lot higher compared to people killed by a shark. Yet the sharks are killed not the cars??? Why still use cars, when people get killed almost everyday from it??? Why kill sharks when shark attacks happens rarely? Because with cars humans can control, we are the ones with the power whereas with sharks we are helpless...

Think about it....

CEPHALORHYNCHUS HECTORI

These is a little bit of information of Hector's Dolphin, in respect to Sir James Hector the founder of this species. Sir James Hector is a New Zealand zoologist. This dolphin's scientific name is cephalorhynchus hectori.

HABITAT

The Hector’s dolphin major habitat type is the coastal waters and is found at the North and South Island at the New Zealand Marine. They live close together in small groups close to the shore and hardly swam further than 30 kilometers from the shore. The dolphins live in a range of water temperature with surface temperature of 6.3 °C to 22 °C and water turbidity of around <10>15 meters.

The North and South Island dolphins are separate species and are genetically and physically different from each other. The subspecies of Hector’s dolphin is known as the Maui’s dolphin. The dolphins are normally found in isolated groups along the north-west coast of the North Island between Dargaville and Taranaki while the Hector’s dolphins are found at the South Island. The total population of the dolphins is somewhere between around 5,000 to 7,000 dolphins and is still decreasing.

FEATURES-APPEARANCES

The dolphins colour is a pale grey but with a closer look it actually has a complex tapestry kind of colour on it. Its forehead is grey which has streaks of black on it. The tip of the dolphin’s beak is black while the throat and chest are white. There is a dark grey patch that runs from the flippers which are also dark grey till the eyes. The belly is white with a stripe that runs from up the sides of the dolphin under its dorsal fin. The bulk at the back and sides are the same colour as the beak. It has about 52-64 teeth both on the top and bottom rows.

The dolphins weigh about around 9 kilograms at birth and grow to about 40-60 kilograms when they are at their adulthood. They dolphins live to about 20 years and are usually in groups of about 2-8. They are active dolphins and do bow-riding and often play with seaweed. When the dolphins leap from the sea, they usually land on their side, creating a loud splash whereas their vertical and horizontal dives are less noisy. The dolphins also surface frequently to breathe which shows a little of their bodies.

FEATURES-DIET

The Hector’s dolphin feed mostly on pelagic and benthic species that are living below the violent weather zone and in shallow waters with a sandy bottom. For example creatures like red cod, mackerel, crabs, flounder or squid. They also occasionally eat krill or other crustaceans in the ocean. Feeding is a group activity for the dolphins. They feed both at either the top or bottom of the ocean and eat about 4 kilograms of fish everyday. The Hector’s dolphin on the East Coast have been found that they mainly eat arrow squid, red cod, Ahuru, sole, stargazer, yellow-eyed mullet and sprat. In summer, the dolphins sometimes follow the inshore trawlers, putting themselves behind the end of the net to find food.

WHY IS IT ENDANGERED?

• Set nets, commonly used to fish in New Zealand.

• A low birth-rate so their population doesn’t increase quickly.

• Trawling a fishing method and also a threat to the dolphins.

• Reckless boat users who do not watch out for the dolphins.

• Marine pollution such as plastic bags, rubbish - these animals ingest them but do not digest them and die of suffocation

• Polluted waters can make the dolphins sick by decreasing the amount of oxygen available.

• Are threatened by human activities such as fishing, habitat destruction and hunting competitions.

• Gillnets usually gets entangled with the dolphin and causing them to drown.

• Due to incidental catches such as the catch of large numbers of dolphins in coastal gillnets and normal fishermen nets where they die of suffocation

• Pollutants such as heavy metals or pesticides on the coastal distribution of the species make it vulnerable, which lowers their immune system leading to more diseases being caught by them and they are then left to die in agony

These magnificent creatures have been facing extinction for quite sometime.The dolphins was given the call “threatened species” status by the Department of Conservation during the month December on the year 1999. They have not stopped facing the threat since then. A number of actions have been taken to secure the numbers of Hector's dolphin but none of them were very successful. Their numbers have been gradually decreasing due to the usage of various fishing nets in New Zealand. A law should be brought up against these fishing nets, limiting it only to either the set nets, trawler nets or gillnets. As this are the major causes of their decrease in numbers.

Some of this information have been gathered by *Maddy for her presentation. Thank you!

WELCOME

This blog was made solely for marine animals that are facing a major crisis of extinction and also to let people know more about these magnificent creatures.

Majority of the marine animals are endangered due to :-

1. Oil spill
2. Toxic waste
3. Fishing competitions
4. Fishing nets
5. Inconsiderate human beings who throw rubbish into the sea or river
   
6. Various fishing methods
7. Greed for money
8. Low birth-rate for some sea mammals
9. High mortality rate
10. Incidental catches

These are only a few factors that marine animals have to face. The fact that us, human beings do not understand them just makes matter worse. Because we don't understand them, we are fear these unique creatures. And our way to eliminate our fear of something, is by eliminating them! On land we are the ones on top of the food chain, which makes us the top predators. However, in the vast open sea, we lose that power. We no longer are the top predators, sharks and other animals are! When we enter the sea, we are entering their world.

Surfers, divers and marine biologists understand that they are the ones who are the invaders and not the other way round. The ecosystem will not function the way it does now if these animals are taken out of the picture. People should learn more about them and eliminate these fears about them and learn to live with them.