Ecology Action Centre Expresses Sympathy Towards Shark Derby Cancellation

HALIFAX - An environmental organization that helped to oversee the administration of shark fishing derbies in Nova Scotia, including an event that ran in Richmond County between 2011 and 2022, is expressing sympathy for local organizers and holding out hope that a revamped version of the event could resurface in future years. 

In mid-July, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) Maritime Region confirmed that the province's three remaining shark derbies would not proceed this summer. The DFO had sanctioned the events in previous years until a scientific license based on the premise that they assisted the department's research into shark populations, but department officials have now stated that the annual derbies no longer serve any scientific or research purpose. 

Shannon Arnold, the Associate Director of Marine Programs for the Halifax-based Ecology Action Centre, told Telile Community Television LJI journalist Adam Cooke that her group was happy to participate on an advisory board that oversaw the shark derbies in Petit de Grat, Lockeport and Yarmouth. DFO officials also participated on this board, which was designed to ensure that the derbies were carried out in a safe environment that was also sensitive to shark populations. 

Noting that concerns about the blue shark population were a major reason for concerns about the derbies in the current climate, Arnold expressed skepticism that one of the DFO's three new criteria for holding the events - that the landed shark must be consumed by participants and/or derby organizers - would work with this specific species. 

"Their meat isn't as good for straight-up use, like mako sharks are, which is a good meat shark - you don't have to really process it," Arnold explained. "But blue sharks have a high urea content, so blue shark meat really has to be processed in order to eat it in some way. But they're still used for fins and stuff like that."

However, Arnold expressed optimism that the DFO's two other new criteria - scientific and/or research merit or the use of a catch-and-release system - could see the shark derbies revived in future years. She pointed to the success of catch-and-release shark derbies and similar events in the United States which often draw thousands of people to small coastal communities.