State: No teeth in new shark-dive rules

TALLAHASSEE -- Underwater off the Florida Keys, Spencer Slate puts a piece of bait fish in his mouth and lets a fierce-looking barracuda snatch it from his lips.

It's a spectacle that draws droves of divers seeking close encounters with wild marine creatures such as sharks, barracudas and moray eels. Slate has been feeding undersea critters like this for more than 20 years.

Now, conservationists are asking the state to ban diving excursions where people release bait in the water to attract predators, especially sharks.

Instead, the state is poised to adopt new "voluntary" guidelines for dive tours that include what seems like a no-brainer: "If the behavior of the marine animals is aggressive or threatening, then the Interactive Marine Experience should be terminated."

It raises the question: Can a shark possibly be expected not to be aggressive when chomping down on a hunk of fresh fish? And if not, then what good are the state's new voluntary guidelines?

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is set to take a vote on the matter on Sept. 6. It's the third time the issue has gone before the commission, but it has taken on new urgency with 25 shark attacks in Florida this year drawing worldwide headlines.

A conservation group called Reef Relief and St. Petersburg state Rep. Charlie Justice are seizing the moment to call for an outright ban on shark feeding. They say it is risky to go out in the ocean and condition sharks to associate people with food.

"Enough is enough," said Paul Johnson of Reef Relief. "We think it's totally inappropriate. All the examples we have on land tell us this is the wrong thing to do, from bears to alligators. There are no public lands in Florida where you can feed wildlife, but yet we're feeding sharks in the ocean."

Dive tour operators are eager to cash in on the so-called "shark dives," and they have lobbied the state's conservation agency in force. When the wildlife commission considered a shark feeding ban last fall, hundreds of shark feeding enthusiasts packed the meeting, saying there isn't any evidence that shark feeding leads to more shark attacks.

"I know the issue is supposed to be that predators will associate people with food, but us divers know that's an absolute joke. Sharks are attracted to bait, not humans. When we go down there without bait, they don't come up and bite us," said Slate, who is known as the "barracuda and moray eel man" of the Keys because of his perilous mouth-to-mouth bait feeding.

After divers lobbied the wildlife commission, the state switched direction.

"The commission has a problem regulating something that hadn't been shown to be a problem," said Bob Palmer, chief for the state's marine fisheries management bureau. "One would think if people were constantly injured through this activity, then we would have heard about it."

Instead of banning shark feeding, the commission asked the diving industry to come up with its own voluntary guidelines. The state than added some of its own. Among them: Divers shouldn't feed sharks by hand, shouldn't feed sharks within a mile of shore, shouldn't feed sharks near other divers or near reefs, and should stop feeding if a shark longer than 5 feet shows up. The state says just four dive tour operators -- two in the Keys and one each in Palm Beach and Broward counties -- offer shark dives.

The divers plan to lobby the commission at its Sept. 6 meeting. But Slate concedes they might face a serious public relations problem.

"This is a bad time for this issue for us because all these people are getting nipped by sharks in the surf,' Slate said.

No matter what the commission decides, Rep. Justice says he will file a bill for the upcoming January legislative session to ban shark feeding.

"This has the potential to affect tourism, with all these people getting bitten by sharks," Justice said. "I think the Legislature should make the final decision on it."

Sharks keep beach closed

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- A one-mile stretch of New Smyrna Beach will remain closed this weekend after a helicopter survey Friday showed dozens of sharks swimming off the coast.

Eight people in the past week have been bitten by sharks while surfing or swimming at the beach. The section south of Ponce Inlet was closed Thursday after two people were bitten Wednesday.

Volusia County Beach Patrol officials who surveyed the area by helicopter spotted 30 to 40 sharks Friday.

-- Associated Press

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Lucy Morgan

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