Why We Shouldn't Consume Top Predators

Of course, bear in mind that this blog entry is our opinion, but we will back that up with scientific research found on our resources page. Sharks have been around for 400 million years, and survived all 5 mass extinction events. Sharks did not evolve into the perfect ocean predator over this inconceivable amount of time to be hunted. They are the hunters. When homo sapiens came into the picture just 200,000 years ago, we slowly took over the place of “top predator” in many eco systems, forcing what came before us to adjust to our presence.

Just like many land based, large predators, sharks do not bounce back from overfishing (or hunting) like the lower trophic level animals that have evolved as prey and therefore reproduce accordingly. Sharks are slow to reach sexual maturity, produce small litter sizes, and hopefully live a very long time. To use Thresher shark as an example, because they are commonly seen in fish markets for their meat, they don’t reach sexual maturity until around age 14, only producing about 4 to 6 pups at a time. In short, harvesting wild animals commercially is usually a temporary boom and bust situation. Wild animals are a finite resource, not a renewable one, unless there is sufficient time for regrowth and recovery. In the case of large predators that it nearly impossible to manage. We are not growing sharks to eat them, we are just taking them.