Living Sea's shark question

[mrtoad]

Does anyone know if this is true or when it happened? This is a quote from an article on the Orlando Sentinal's website:

" Disney once put a small bull shark in its Living Seas exhibit at Epcot. It grew. The theory is that if you feed sharks, they will behave. That theory evaporated when the bull shark bit another shark in half.

Worried about the implications for Scuba Mickey, Disney sent in a hunter with a bang stick one day after the park closed. It took most of the night, but the shark finally was terminated."

If it is true, I am just surprised they killed it. Though maybe it was not safe to drop it in the sea.

Here is the link to the full story which is about bull sharks.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news...jun28,0,841820.column?coll=orl-home-headlines

 

[disneydreams]

yea that doesn't seem likely but i don't know

 

[Hakunamatata]

So, what if they did.....its their pond.....

 

[EpcotGrl]

You know I've sometimes wondered about that? Like, what if some family is there oohing and ahhing over fish and all of a sudden CHOMP!? That'd take some magic right outta the day...

Tho you'd think with animals like that they would've gotten all the info before adding it to the tank, but *shrug*

 

[mrtoad]

So, what if they did.....its their pond.....

I'm not saying I care, I am just shocked because you would think animal rights groups would go nuts. It would be like if you had a dog that bit someone one and you took it out back and shot it. You would get in trouble for it because you did not turn it in to have something done humanely.

 

[Connor002]

nature is unpredictable

if its true, at least they "took care of it" before somthing that would realy ruin the magic happened, somthing involving shark teeth and a scuba-diving mickey

 

[bhg469]

Wow sounds crazy

 

[WDW1971]

So, what if they did.....its their pond.....

Did anyone notice shark being the special at any WDW restaurants? :lol:

 

[WDW1971]

I'm not saying I care, I am just shocked because you would think animal rights groups would go nuts. It would be like if you had a dog that bit someone one and you took it out back and shot it. You would get in trouble for it because you did not turn it in to have something done humanely.

They mostly only care about the fuzzy/cuddly animals.

 

[Hakunamatata]

I'm not saying I care, I am just shocked because you would think animal rights groups would go nuts. It would be like if you had a dog that bit someone one and you took it out back and shot it. You would get in trouble for it because you did not turn it in to have something done humanely.

And the next shark victims family would be suing Disney alleging that the bull shark they released was the one that bit their loved one.....Disney did the right thing.....

 

[lamarvenoy]

I've lived in florida most of my life and snakes don't bother me and I have no fear of alligators but sharks scare me. I grew up surfing and I have only seen dark obscure objects that we presumed to be sharks from my board but it wasn't until I started diving at about 19 years old when i realized just how many there are.I don't like telling people to be scared of sharks because attacks are rare and very randem but in all honesty I wish I had never started diving,then I could swim without fear again.They ARE out there....lots of them and I've seen plenty of hammerheads and bulls close to shore.

 

[Dayma]

I cant imagine this story being true. They caught a ton of flak with AK opened and I doubt they would risk that again.

 

[JROK]

I'm not saying I care, I am just shocked because you would think animal rights groups would go nuts. It would be like if you had a dog that bit someone one and you took it out back and shot it. You would get in trouble for it because you did not turn it in to have something done humanely.

How do you humanely take care of a shark? You can't put it to sleep... you can take it out of the water and let it suffocate, but is that cool? Just stab it and it's done... I do a lot of shark fishing in the Gulf of Mexico just off the coast of Clearwater/Dunedin and we catch quite a few Bull sharks... they are mean son of a guns... Black Tips are really fiesty as well and tend to leap from the water like a Tarpon does... but Bull sharks are mean and I have no clue why they even stuck it in the tank to begin with... usually if we pull it up beside the boat and identify it as a bull shark, we don't even bother trying to get the hook out and just cut the leader... they're angry animals... called BULL sharks for a reason...

It's so strange how ignorant people can be... if there was a shark attack a few days before I went to the beach, you can guarantee that I would not go in the water for atleast 2-3 weeks... Some people are so strange that we've been fishing in the bay with a chum bag over the side pulling up shark after shark and watching them swimming around our boat attacking other fish... and the boaters near us will be out playing in the water and having fun... we'll shout, "Hey, we've got a chumline and we're catching a lot of sharks..." and they just go, "Ok..." like they don't care if they get their foot bit off... sharks are no fun... unless you're fishing for them ...

Sorry for going off-topic...

 

[Aurora23]

The Living Seas (as well as the Animal Kingdom) is/are accredited by the AZA. There are certain rules they have to follow to be accredited by AZA standards. I'm not exactly sure what those rules are, but I'm sure what ever the case, Disney follows them.

 

[gregburg]

Doubtful that they "terminated it". In may I did the DiveQuest tour. Before the tour you get a tour and a chance to ask a lot of questions. Turns out that the sharks had just been returned to the tank since they did a copper treatment to the environment. This is particularily toxic to sharks so they had to be removed. My question was "How did you do that?" Turns out that where the dolphins can rest is a two tank area that can be segmented. They put the dolphins in one of those off stage areas, then segmented it so they could not get to the main area or to the other off stage area. Then they opened a gate in the fence that separate the dolphin area from the rest of the aquarium (you can see this large fence on the left side of the main aquarium when you go to the main viewing area). At this point the sharks were guided to the off stage area.

From here they are able to "lift" the floor of the off stage tank so that the shark is slowly lifted out of the water, then put into a sling and taken to a set of quarantine tanks in a separate building behind the main facility. Most likely this is how they would have pulled any offending shark out of the main tank. From there it would have been donated to another aquarium or released.

Turns out that they were having issues with some new sharks that were introduced last fall. They added 5 sand tiger sharks to the exhibit. Three of the five were deemed aggressive to residents and divers and were in the process of being transferred to other aquariums where they would be put into a pure shark exhibit.

Other notes about the sharks: They are trained or conditioned to only eat when called with a distinct sound. They are fed using essentially large (5 foot long) tongs by a cast member who is on the deck (not in the water). This station on the deck is at about the 3 o’clock position looking out from the center of the tank, along the outside edge. Or if you were in the restaurant it would be just to the right of the right most window. A cast member told me this, since when the sharks are fed they will lose teeth (natural process) and told me that during the dive I should look around that spot and I my get a souvenir (I didn’t) (I got this advice since I’ve done the tour several times, and was the only diver that day, which rocked).

-Greg

 

[bhg469]

I've lived in florida most of my life and snakes don't bother me and I have no fear of alligators but sharks scare me. I grew up surfing and I have only seen dark obscure objects that we presumed to be sharks from my board but it wasn't until I started diving at about 19 years old when i realized just how many there are.I don't like telling people to be scared of sharks because attacks are rare and very randem but in all honesty I wish I had never started diving,then I could swim without fear again.They ARE out there....lots of them and I've seen plenty of hammerheads and bulls close to shore.

no really thanks alot

 

[mrtoad]

And the next shark victims family would be suing Disney alleging that the bull shark they released was the one that bit their loved one.....Disney did the right thing.....

I live in Northern NJ and bears are caught are released all the time. And we do have bear attacks up here (if a bear attacks someone it will be shot though). Within 15 minutes of my house we have had a bear attack a child on a front porch, one kill a LLama (spelling?) that someone had as a pet and one drag a pony into the woods. Yet despite all that, they do catch and release bears in our state. I would think doing the same with a shark would be the same but what do I know...

 

[mrtoad]

A bang stick does not stab a shark, it pretty much explodes part of the shark and does not always kill it right away. I would think it would be rather painful....

I know enough about sharks to be afraid of them. I have been facinated with them since I was a kid and no I don't go in the ocean (bad Jaws experience in 4th grade).

How do you humanely take care of a shark? You can't put it to sleep... you can take it out of the water and let it suffocate, but is that cool? Just stab it and it's done... I do a lot of shark fishing in the Gulf of Mexico just off the coast of Clearwater/Dunedin and we catch quite a few Bull sharks... they are mean son of a guns... Black Tips are really fiesty as well and tend to leap from the water like a Tarpon does... but Bull sharks are mean and I have no clue why they even stuck it in the tank to begin with... usually if we pull it up beside the boat and identify it as a bull shark, we don't even bother trying to get the hook out and just cut the leader... they're angry animals... called BULL sharks for a reason...

It's so strange how ignorant people can be... if there was a shark attack a few days before I went to the beach, you can guarantee that I would not go in the water for atleast 2-3 weeks... Some people are so strange that we've been fishing in the bay with a chum bag over the side pulling up shark after shark and watching them swimming around our boat attacking other fish... and the boaters near us will be out playing in the water and having fun... we'll shout, "Hey, we've got a chumline and we're catching a lot of sharks..." and they just go, "Ok..." like they don't care if they get their foot bit off... sharks are no fun... unless you're fishing for them ...

Sorry for going off-topic...

 

[gregburg]

For the record there are not any bull sharks in the Living Seas. To my knowledge it has never had a bull shark in the tank. The sharks in the tank are very carefully selected so that they are not aggressive to the other residents and divers. Bull sharks have never fit that profile.

-Greg

 

[AimeeEvans]

Thank goodness there are no bull sharks!! I was about ready to cancel my dive scheduled for the 6th. Greg- are you sure none are aggressive?? Aimee