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Over the past half century, oceanic, or open-ocean, shark and ray population sizes have shrunk by 71 percent, according to a study published January 27 in Nature, a trend that coincides with increased fishing of these species.
“Knowing that this is a global figure, the findings are stark,” coauthor Nick Dulvy of Simon Fraser University says in a statement. “If we don’t do anything, it will be too late. It’s much worse than other animal populations we’ve been looking at. It’s an incredible rate of decline steeper than most elephant and rhino declines, and those animals are iconic in driving conservation efforts on land.”
There are 31 shark and ray species in the open ocean, 24 of which are now endangered, according to the Red List Index standards of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Three species—the oceanic whitetip, scalloped hammerhead, and great hammerhead—are ...
