You're a pretty savvy shark. You've been around the coral reef a time or two, and you've had a couple of litters. You know that manatees are harmless and that the biggest threat to your bull shark pup is another bull shark. You also know that there is another, even greater threat to your survival: humans. But if you think that the threats Homo sapiens pose are all spears and boat propellers, you've got a lot to learn. In odd ways, some human activities can even help you out. Take this quiz to see just how sharp your teeth are.
Written by Josh Clark, HowStuffWorks
Sharks on the Run Quiz
As a gummy shark, you should be aware that the people who live on the land around your area like to eat you. In particular, you should avoid an area called the Southern and Eastern Shark and Scalefish Fishery, as it's here that you go from a shark to a delicacy the humans call "fish and chips." Do you know what they call this part of the world topside?
England
India
Australia
Ireland
You're a smart gummy shark. That smattering of land masses that bump up against your home in the Bass Strait is called Australia. Some other areas that you like to swim around are called Tasmania and New South Wales. It's in these temperate waters that you find the best hunting for squid and crustaceans. Unfortunately, humans like to hunt for you around here too.
You're a spinner shark living off the coast of Florida. Have you ever noticed that on some particularly cold winter days, the manatees congregate along some weird human invention near the ocean? It seems that the water is particularly warm here and the manatees like to come to heat up. Do you know what that human invention is?
A water treatment plant
A power plant
An automobile factory
An oil refinery
You may have noticed that every once in awhile the temperatures get a little cold in your Florida home. While you have no trouble with this, since you're cold-blooded, some warm-blooded marine mammals like manatees seek the heat produced by warm wastewater heated by power plant cooling towers and introduced to the nearby ocean. As you've surely found, when a couple dozen manatees gather in one place, the fish they attract make good eating and easy hunting.
In your breeding ground in the Northern Gulf of Mexico in the summer of 2010, you gave birth to a litter of pups, but found that the nursery ground had been polluted. The humans call it oil, and it makes the water thick, murky and dangerous. Which of these pose the likeliest danger to you and your pups?
Oil entering your gill system and choking you
Oil entering the food chain
Oil eating away at your skin
Oil dampening your ampullae of Lorenzini, making navigation impossible
Since you're a sharp bull shark, you'll likely avoid the thickest plumes of oil, which means that oil's effects on you will likely be relegated to your food intake. You're an apex predator, which means you're at the top of the food chain. While this means you as a bull shark have few if any natural predators, it also means that you have the most opportunities to be poisoned by oil. As smaller organisms absorb oil, they're eaten by larger fish. Other fish eat these fish and so on, until the oil has accumulated to its peak level in the food you eat.
As a whale shark, you are the largest fish in the sea. Your kind can grow as large as 65 feet (20 meters) long and weigh as much as 20 tons. While you're considered by most a gentle giant of the sea, some humans think that you're very tasty and like to use you as the star ingredient in a dish called shark fin soup. You'll have to be extra careful in what area, where you continue to be hunted for your fins?
Nigeria
Taiwan
South Africa
Mexico
You've got a wide belt of a habitat that follows the equator. As you travel the globe devouring plankton, you'll want to be careful in the Asian Pacific, particularly around Taiwan where whale shark hunting continues despite a 2007 government ban. This country remains notorious for being populated by humans that hunt you. You'll also want to be sharp around the Philippines and Indonesia as well. Perhaps you'll be better off in areas like India, the U.S. and Mexico, where hunting you is banned.
As a bonnethead shark living off the coast of Georgia, you have it decidedly easier than your whale shark cousins in Taiwan. While you likely won't be fished by humans, you still have dangers to beware of. For instance, do you know why you should be wary when you encounter a school of shrimp?
You can be caught in nets along with shrimp
Shrimp have venom to defend against sharks
Shrimp attract larger sharks that like to eat bonnetheads like you
Swimming through a school of shrimp can cause them to lodge in your gills, choking you
While you aren't directly fished in the U.S., humans still catch bonnetheads and other sharks like you indirectly through activities like shrimping. This process is called bycatching. While humans don't mean to pull you up along with the shrimp in their nets, getting caught usually spells death for you. Sadly, a lot of humans who care about sharks don't realize that a lot of them died for their favorite shrimp dishes.
Humans on land worry about a process they call climate change. For the most part, they're concerned about the carbon dioxide entering the atmosphere. But as a great white shark, you've got news for them: CO2 is having a negative impact below water, too. What is the name for the effect of large amounts of CO2 entering your marine ecosystem?
Ocean warming
Marine climate change
Ocean acidification
Marine carbon release
Humans have largely overlooked the effects of carbon dioxide introduction into the ocean. The resulting process is called ocean acidification because the CO2 changes the ph levels of the marine ecosystem. As the waters of your home become less basic and more acidic, you've noticed that coral reefs are becoming weaker, as are the shells of your crustacean neighbors. You can't help but wonder what will happen to sharks in the coming decades if ocean acidification progresses. Among other things, it could change the habitat of reef shark species and the diet of crustacean-eating sharks.
Correct
Hmmm. Maybe you could use a bit more omega-3 in your diet?
Correct
You're smart, but still pretty naive for a shark. Maybe you need a mentor.
Correct
You're a pretty savvy shark! Every shark should be as clever as you.
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