Sharks, the Wolf, and press lies....

What could have been an informative article about sharks turned into a rather sensationalistic piece of commercial journalism.

Read article

Unfortunately, I was somewhat naive believing that what I said in the interview would help the cause of educating people about sharks. I had no previous experience with the press but as Rudy Socha put it: "Wolf, look at the bright side, at 66 it was time for you to lose your virginity..."

Thus, I read for the first time in my life, mouth wide open, that I "survived 50 years of swimming with sharks", then I saw myself in a photograph surrounded by 30 "tiger sharks", and a minor, rather irrelevant accident (the bite of a shark I clearly provoked) became the centerpiece of the article.

OK, I understand newspapers need some hype to get their readers' attention. However, reporters should always stick to the truth, no matter what. There is a blatant lie in the article that I find intolerable: The "Daily Mail" states that I am 67 years old - that is simply not true; I am only 66 years and 10 months old.... :-)

Bulls seen from a gull's perspective

Jim Abernethy has got to be one of the sharkiest shark operators on earth. He passionately loves sharks, and he runs the by now famous trips to Tiger Beach in the Bahamas. When he is in Palm Beach in between trips, and not at home taking it easy, you can be sure to find this energetic and bubbly man high up in the air - watching sharks from above. He just can't get enough of them - no need to explain that to me.... :-)

Jim is a committed professional, and has loyal clients who would not switch operators. But he also has a new friend - me - who would not dive with him. Huh?? Say what?? Well, simple: Jim does not allow freedivers on his shark trips, and I do not have a license to scuba dive.

I tried to convince Jim to make an exception with me - he wouldn't; he tried to talk me into getting certified so I could join him - I most definitely won't dive with tanks, ever. Period. So we will not be diving together among sharks although we are both 110% shark fanatics. Too bad.... :-(

What we have done together, however, was observing schools of bull sharks in shallow water in Palm Beach. Jim very kindly invited me to a memorable flight in his ultra-light plane to do some shark watching from the lofty perspective of a gull.

To be able to identify large bull sharks against the sandy bottom from an altitude of maybe 500 - 700 ft was a truly elevating experience for a hard-core shark diver! It was most gratifying to see dozens, if not hundreds, of sharks, well and alive, knowing that they will in all likelihood live out their lives naturally, unharmed by humans.

Long live the tigers of Tiger Beach and the bulls of Palm Beach, and may the waters in both places be always as "shark infested" as I was privileged to see them, underwater and from above!

Dances with Sharks

These are two photographs taken by Paul Spielvogel, Staff Photographer of Eli Martinez's Sharkdiver Magazine. Paul is an attorney, and photographing sharks is his hobby - or should I say his 'passion'? When Paul and I met on a fantastic Tiger Shark trip organized by Eli on Scottie Smith's Dolphin Dream II, we both immediately sensed that our 'chemistry' is made of the same elements... It is gratifying to meet congenial people.

I really like these pics: With them Paul captured the essence of my love for sharks. Whatever I had to say about digital photography (see the Nikonos V blog posted recently) does not apply here. I am glad Paul had a digital camera while I was playing with the sharks.

The lemon sharks of Tiger Beach are adorable, very much like a bunch of friendly dogs. They don't mind you being there, they might bump you gently but are not aggressive at all. The lemons of Tiger Beach are a real treat!

The tiger girl I am touching on her back is "Olga" - she is a cool 11 - 12 ft babe who established a special relationship with Folkart which I will keep discreetly as a secret.... :-)

Old but new to me

I was going through my blog feeds today and came across the photo above. First thought was "this is a fake" - but that was before I saw the copyright: Thomas Peschak. My dad had met and dove with him in South Africa. I emailed him the photo and he told me that it is in fact "untouched" - part of a whole series actually. Thomas wrote a post on his kayaking with white sharks experience and mentioned the amount of inquiries he received because of the photo.

On a side note, my boss kayaks - I sent her this photo and she was gun-ho to do it - MAN UP!

Next Generation of Killers

Is there any hope for the next generation, not when you have kids like Aidan Murray Medley. He caught (and indirectly) killed a 551 lbs bull shark off the coast of Florida. Is there not a "catch and release" (or tag for that matter) ethic when fishing? Sure Aidan's parents were proud of him - they should spend some time with little Aidan researching the current state of the shark population, in case they read this post:

http://www.npca.org/marine_and_coastal/marine_wildlife/sharks.html
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=2616156
http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/sharks/innews/sharkpopdecline2003.htm

Read full story here.

PS - Is Alibaba.com still distributing shark fins?

Nikonos V

I received an email from my dad last night, and found out he is having a secret love affair:

"Felix: I just rinsed my good old Nikonos cameras - do you know what I felt? I felt that I actually love them.

These awkward looking olive-green instruments have really served me well, and I would never trade them for a digital camera.

When I compare myself to the digital photographers, I now realize that when I take a picture, I am in full control: I look through the view-finder, I set the focus, I compose, and, most importantly, I do not shoot wildly. I normally take one roll of film (36 images) on a dive, and have, thus, to be careful not to waste precious film material whereas "they", my digital colleagues, have no such worries and can happily squeeze the shutter 200-300 times during the same time.

Of course, there are exceptions, Roger Horrocks, Thomas Peschak, Sijmon de Waal, for instance, and certainly many other pros who, as excellent photographers such as David Doubilet, Doug Perrine, or Amos Nachoum have the images in their heads before "exposing" the chip (or whatever a digital camera does...). To be sure, I have seen absolutely stunning digital photographs, images that can hardly be surpassed with a Nikonos or another traditional underwater camera.

When I take a picture, I do it very consciously - digital photography generally tempts the photographers to shoot indiscriminately; as I said, they can afford doing that. I have seen many holding their cameras away from them, so as to move the lens, not themselves, closer to their subjects, and then all they do is just firing - to get as many frames per second as possible. These photographers and their digital cameras are not a unity anymore.

I have also seen guys attaching their digital cameras to a pole and lowering them into the water to be able to photograph sharks from a distance of a few inches. Admittedly, that way you could, with some luck, get spectacular close-ups - but, sorry, that kind of photography does not have any appeal to me whatsoever. The disciples of the new technology would tell me in answer: "At the end of the day it is the quality of the pic that counts, not how you made it". Yes, and yet....

To sum it up, despite all the limitations of the traditional photography, there is still much soul and that indescribable old mystique in it which the digital technology has taken away from the joy of photography - well, that is how I feel about it.

I will, therefore, stick to my Nikonos as long as I will be able to dive, and as long as there will still be 35mm film around - and, of course, folks to develop them.

Ah, there is something else: the digital photographers have the dubious pleasure of instant gratification - they can see right away whether or not the pics they took came out well whereas I have to wait days, if not weeks, with much suspense before I can appreciate the results of my photography. But that's just it - can you imagine the immense kick I get going through my freshly developed negatives and being able to intensely relive my diving adventures long after the vacation has ended?...."

Crystal Water Revival

What we oceanic dreamers, Felix and I, expected in Crystal River was this: crystal clear water, and many manatees. We saw manatees, yes, only two, a mom and her calf, unfortunately in muddy waters, but at the spring of the river we were able to dive in water so clear we actually had the sensation of flowing weightlessly in liquid space...

There, where Crystal River wells up from under the ground, we found no manatees but an underwater scenery of a strangely surreal beauty only a poet could perhaps adequately describe. I am not a poet; I am a photographer, and all I could do was trying to frame what I saw applying the basic rules of a well composed image.

Swimming with manatees is an experience ocean divers will never forget: 'sea cows' have got to be the most gentle aquatic creatures. Operators urge visitors not to touch the sluggish animals - and while Felix and I just could not hold back stroking their backs once, we thought it was right to leave the manatees alone and just watch them.

The fun did not last long, however, as some 15 other snorkelers arrived on the spot only to do what we did: trying to get to the animals as close as possible which was just too much for the manatee mom and her kid - they left the scene and quickly vanished into the impenetrable mist of the greenish waters.

Tibu was with us and could only watch us snorkeling this time; we had to promise him to come back once he feels grown-up enough to face the ultimate challenge for a land-lubber Weimaraner: dive into the wet unknown...