Something not yet mentioned is that size matters. Almost all attacks on paddlecraft have been on shorter boats (13’ or less). A longer kayak seems to convey a degree of safety as most hunting animals do not prey on animals larger than themselves.
Probably not much sense of security if the shark is 20+ feet long, but “we need a bigger boat” is not a bad philosophy ;).
Rick
@rjd9999 said:
Something not yet mentioned is that size matters. Almost all attacks on paddlecraft have been on shorter boats (13’ or less). A longer kayak seems to convey a degree of safety as most hunting animals do not prey on animals larger than themselves.
Probably not much sense of security if the shark is 20+ feet long, but “we need a bigger boat” is not a bad philosophy ;).Rick
It certainly works with gators that way.
@rjd9999 said:
Something not yet mentioned is that size matters. Almost all attacks on paddlecraft have been on shorter boats (13’ or less). A longer kayak seems to convey a degree of safety as most hunting animals do not prey on animals larger than themselves.
Probably not much sense of security if the shark is 20+ feet long, but “we need a bigger boat” is not a bad philosophy ;).
Actually, not quite accurate.
in 2014, Canoe and Kayak Magazine ran a series of articles about the great white attacks in California and tried to break down the data to see if one type of boat, color, or whatever was more prevalent in attacks than others. On the whole, their isn’t enough data to say any one type of kayak is more likely to be bitten, but there does seem to be slightly more pedal driven kayaks bitten than the usage numbers would account for.
https://www.canoekayak.com/kayakfish/kayakfish-features/great-white-attacks/
https://www.canoekayak.com/kayakfish/kayakfish-features/paddle-vs-pedal-matter-great-white/
https://www.canoekayak.com/kayakfish/kayakfish-features/great-white-color-question/
On size, Tony Johnson’s boat wasn’t listed with size, but it was about17’ long. Duane’s was listed as 17’6". One Hobie was listed as 14, so we know at least 3 on the list are 14’ or longer. Most of the Hobies used in this area for kayak fishing are on the longer size (the 14’ or 16’ ones), so likely at least 2 more of the Hobies are 14 or longer. So I would estimate 5 of the 15 listed with size are 14’ or longer.
In other example, Sean Morely was buzzed by an aggressive blue shark off the Channel Islands of California. He was in a long sea kayak.
Freya Hoffmesiter’s kayak was nipped once or twice by sharks in Australia. She was in an 18’ Epic sea kayak.
I have paddled in a lake that was famous for Pirhana and never saw one.
I have paddled in a river that was known for alligators, never saw one.
I have paddled and snorkled in waters that were famous for sharks and never saw one.
I also knew a rescue helicopter pilot who took photos of dozens of White Sharks (we cannot call the great whites anymore) circling swimmers and THEY never saw one.
Look at the stats. As Peter-Ca said, he paddles in the ‘red-triangle’ which has one attack per year but how many hundreds of thousands of people swim in that water and never see a shark.
I think it is a mind game. I am more afraid of a speedboat driven by some stupid college jerk impressing his gf than I am about being eaten by a pirhana, alligator or shark.
The top 5 states for shark attacks with data collected from 1837 to present are…
Massachusetts has had only 4 reported in that time period.
Raisns “shark bait” boat was in the 16-18 ft range. It got shark bit on the stern two or three times and was cracked by a large falling fish that jumped and landed on the fore deck. For sharks I don’t think size matters. I think location, appearance and movement matters more. His were all at night. His were all “fish scale” appearing carbon fiber construction.
A lot of Florida shark attacks happen in central east coast where a lot of bait is washed out of some inlets. There is a shark migration up and down the Atlantic coast spring and fall. Then too there is a mullet migration about the same time. People just get in the way.
Of course I know of one in 2004 on the gulf coast where a kid was surf fishing on Money Beach with bait shrimp in his pants pocket. Any idea where the shark hit him?
I was always a bit leery of Sebastian Inlet. Volusia county is the hotspot for shark bites in FL. Yes I stay out of the water at night, but do paddle in the dark sometimes.
We often catch baby blacktips in the SC marshes fishing for speckled trout. They are less than a foot long. It is my understanding they breed there. They are one of the migrating species that go up and down the coast. It surprised me that SC has more than twice as many attacks as Texas.
If you find worms in seatrout they are likely shark parasites looking for a shark to eat the seatrout so they can mature in the shark and lay more eggs in shark poo.
@Overstreet said:
There is an organization studying great whites. Just the GW are tagged. The spinners and black tips and bulls are photographed by aircraft…swimming around the beach swimmers.
I often take a look at http://www.ocearch.org/ prior to my monthly stroll around Cumberland I. to check for ‘known’ GWs.
Haven’t seen any ‘red’ (current sightings) in a while, notice they still are showing Baily off Jacksonville, last seen in 2015, but often seen leading many of the club paddles.
I see that Baily is a Tiger Shark. Big either way. Note most of Baily’s track is along the shelf at the gulf stream.
How many kayakers have been attacked by sharks off the coast of MA? As far as I can find the number is zero. I surf very often at a break where a swimmer was killed by a great white shark about ten years ago. I don’t surf there at dusk or before the sun comes up in April -June. That is the extent of precautions I take. Great whites are not really interested in humans, we don’t have much body fat that they need for energy and we are not recognized as food;, most attacks on humans by GWS are accidents where they mistake a swimmer for a sea lion or seal. Don’t swim or paddle with marine mammals, don’t fish from your kayak, don’t kayak around people who fish, especially those that let the fish bleed out into the water or their boat. I have been kayaking on the California coast now for about 20 years, I’ve seen many, many sharks, I have seen three Great Whites close up … none of the sharks had any interest in me or my kayak. I know a paddler who had his kayak bitten several years ago off the coast of Las Angeles, he is the only kayaker I have ever heard of who had a problem with a GWS who was not fishing.
Oh yeah and regarding Zebra Patterns . I bought a surf kayak several years ago from a guy in Santa Cruz CA, who had applied one of those huge Zebra Pattern Decals that covered the entire bottom of the 8’ surf kayak. When I would surf in Lajolla the pattern actually attracted Leopard Sharks who would surf with me like dolphins following a boat. I thought this was a great joke for quite a while and made some videos. In one video I noticed that there were two sharks that were not Leopard Sharks surfing with me, we call them black tips or reef sharks, I don’t think that is their official name though. I sold that kayak to a guy who lives in MA. You might see it sometime it’s a light blue Mako Aquarius.
Well, there was this. Another article said they had heard the sharks were feeding on seals and went to take pictures. Another just said they were out to take pics of seals.
http://www.capecodtimes.com/article/20140904/NEWS/409040337
@Peter-CA said:
@rjd9999 said:
Something not yet mentioned is that size matters. Almost all attacks on paddlecraft have been on shorter boats (13’ or less). A longer kayak seems to convey a degree of safety as most hunting animals do not prey on animals larger than themselves.
Probably not much sense of security if the shark is 20+ feet long, but “we need a bigger boat” is not a bad philosophy ;).Actually, not quite accurate.
in 2014, Canoe and Kayak Magazine ran a series of articles about the great white attacks in California and tried to break down the data to see if one type of boat, color, or whatever was more prevalent in attacks than others. On the whole, their isn’t enough data to say any one type of kayak is more likely to be bitten, but there does seem to be slightly more pedal driven kayaks bitten than the usage numbers would account for.
…stuff deleted
In the animal world, size matters. You fend off large predators by making yourself seem larger and by being aggressive. It doesn’t always work, after all, we’ve probably seen the video of a 12’ great white trying to take on a similarly sized orca pup. Mom, however, seemed to feel this was a major breech of protocol and had effortless fun throwing that carcass around. After all, it was barely over 1000 pounds.
There is no reason to assume that this does not work with great whites as well. Animals don’t take on what is perceived as dangerous to them, so size does matter. It isn’t perfect protection and often, the hypothesis goes, larger boats may be perceived as territorial threats and are bumped and sometimes bitten.
The thing is that a 14’ shark thinks it’s the baddest ass in the ocean, until something bigger comes by. A similarly sized kayak may be seen as a sexual or territorial (nobody really knows what triggers bumping/biting in sharks that are not actively feeding) threat and be treated as a competitor. A boat larger than this may stave off that type of challenge from a smaller fish. This does not mean that longer boats aren’t attacked, but the stats (worldwide) show that shorter boats are more likely to be attacked.
This may mean that longer boat = longer shark doing the attack (kind of a selection bias in that the largest sharks may include boats as long as they are as something to challenge).
The question is whether there is actually any proof of this and the answer is, no. Extrapolating what is known about other large predators, however, has proven to provide some accuracy in relation to shark behavior.
Those who feed sharks used to feel that shark intelligence was too limited to associated food at the end of a pole spear with the humans holding that spear. This was found to be an association sharks quickly learn. Sharks and rays, in areas where feeding has occurred, often swim toward SCUBA divers in the region when they enter the water. Attacks have increased in these areas, as well.
The thing is, sharks are as intelligent, agile, powerful, and fast as they need to be to survive. This design (ie. one shared by tigers and great whites) has, over 400 million years has worked exceedingly well. They may well be the most successful group of predators on the planet (if not for the sperm whale and orca, though they are of much more recent design). They (likely) do not attack unless they perceive a distinct advantage in the conflict and this means not attacking something unknown that is larger than themselves.
I stand by my comment that most attacks (I will discard the “almost all”) occur on boats that are 14’ or shorter (as this is the majority of boats, it is a safe statement). I will also stand by my comment that size conveys some degree of protection.
I will also add the caveat that my father saw great whites and tigers try to take a bite out of the side of the Enterprise when he was at sea. He may have been telling me yarns, but on the off chance he was correct, it seems likely that once they reach sufficient size, they may not feel terribly threatened by anything.
Rick
@rjd9999 said:
@Peter-CA said:
@rjd9999 said:
Something not yet mentioned is that size matters. Almost all attacks on paddlecraft have been on shorter boats (13’ or less). A longer kayak seems to convey a degree of safety as most hunting animals do not prey on animals larger than themselves.
Probably not much sense of security if the shark is 20+ feet long, but “we need a bigger boat” is not a bad philosophy ;).Actually, not quite accurate.
in 2014, Canoe and Kayak Magazine ran a series of articles about the great white attacks in California and tried to break down the data to see if one type of boat, color, or whatever was more prevalent in attacks than others. On the whole, their isn’t enough data to say any one type of kayak is more likely to be bitten, but there does seem to be slightly more pedal driven kayaks bitten than the usage numbers would account for.
…stuff deleted
In the animal world, size matters. You fend off large predators by making yourself seem larger and by being aggressive. It doesn’t always work, after all, we’ve probably seen the video of a 12’ great white trying to take on a similarly sized orca pup. Mom, however, seemed to feel this was a major breech of protocol and had effortless fun throwing that carcass around. After all, it was barely over 1000 pounds.
There is no reason to assume that this does not work with great whites as well. Animals don’t take on what is perceived as dangerous to them, so size does matter. It isn’t perfect protection and often, the hypothesis goes, larger boats may be perceived as territorial threats and are bumped and sometimes bitten.
The thing is that a 14’ shark thinks it’s the baddest ass in the ocean, until something bigger comes by. A similarly sized kayak may be seen as a sexual or territorial (nobody really knows what triggers bumping/biting in sharks that are not actively feeding) threat and be treated as a competitor. A boat larger than this may stave off that type of challenge from a smaller fish. This does not mean that longer boats aren’t attacked, but the stats (worldwide) show that shorter boats are more likely to be attacked.
This may mean that longer boat = longer shark doing the attack (kind of a selection bias in that the largest sharks may include boats as long as they are as something to challenge).
The question is whether there is actually any proof of this and the answer is, no. Extrapolating what is known about other large predators, however, has proven to provide some accuracy in relation to shark behavior.
Those who feed sharks used to feel that shark intelligence was too limited to associated food at the end of a pole spear with the humans holding that spear. This was found to be an association sharks quickly learn. Sharks and rays, in areas where feeding has occurred, often swim toward SCUBA divers in the region when they enter the water. Attacks have increased in these areas, as well.
The thing is, sharks are as intelligent, agile, powerful, and fast as they need to be to survive. This design (ie. one shared by tigers and great whites) has, over 400 million years has worked exceedingly well. They may well be the most successful group of predators on the planet (if not for the sperm whale and orca, though they are of much more recent design). They (likely) do not attack unless they perceive a distinct advantage in the conflict and this means not attacking something unknown that is larger than themselves.
I stand by my comment that most attacks (I will discard the “almost all”) occur on boats that are 14’ or shorter (as this is the majority of boats, it is a safe statement). I will also stand by my comment that size conveys some degree of protection.
I will also add the caveat that my father saw great whites and tigers try to take a bite out of the side of the Enterprise when he was at sea. He may have been telling me yarns, but on the off chance he was correct, it seems likely that once they reach sufficient size, they may not feel terribly threatened by anything.
Rick
As a bit of a caveat, the size matters issue, as it relates to sharks, is true for living prey but obviously not for dead animals…witness the various videos of sharks feasting on dead whale carcasses. Which makes me wonder, if a potentially dangerous (i.e., large) shark is showing interest in you, is it better to keep paddling or to follow what would be many’s unavoidable instinct to freeze, keep your arms in your boat, pray it goes away, etc. By ceasing all activity, are you mimicking an inanimate, inedible piece of flotsam, or a potentially large and harmless meal?
This popped up on the web site for our local PBS station today - a podcast (with transcript) of risk of shark attack in California:
How Worried Should You Be About Shark Attacks on the California Coast?
https://www.kqed.org/news/11657595/how-worried-should-you-be-about-shark-attacks-on-the-california-coast
Look into the shark shield. https://sharkshield.com Watch the videos and read the testimonies. I have one that I use with both my surfski and ocean kayak. It gives me some piece of mind especially when cruising alone off the coast of Southern California.
And not all sharks are predatory. There is a big rise in basking shark sightings