GANSBAAI, South Africa (Oct. 19, 2003) -- Conservation officials have been tipped off that perlemoen poachers, faced with declining stocks of the lucrative shellfish, are killing protected Great White sharks and selling jaws and teeth for high prices to foreign tourists. Great White sharks are protected and it is illegal to kill them or sell any part of them in South Africa. Michael Scholl, a Swiss shark researcher based at Gansbaai, said yesterday he had been offered a single Great White shark tooth for $100. "It's very worrying because the international trade is still legal," he said. "A big White shark jaw can fetch $10 000 in the United States." Yesterday, law enforcement officers searched two curio shops in Hermanus and seized Great White shark teeth that had been made into jewellery. Craig Spencer, Overstrand municipality's conservation chief, said he had received information that a group of perlemoen poachers in Hawston and another group in Gansbaai had turned to Great Whites as a lucrative source of income. "We haven't any evidence of Great White sharks being killed, but their teeth are being sold right here under our noses and they come from somewhere," he said. "This is the first crackdown we've had on selling them. It is an offence and we regard it in a very serious light." Spencer and his newly formed "Marines" anti-poaching unit, made up of municipal conservation staff and Marine and Coastal Management members, searched the shops and with the help of two marine biologists who identified which teeth were those of Great Whites. | | Jeff Tanner, owner of the shops, said he did not know it was illegal to sell the teeth. He said he had got them from a man at the Hermanus craft market who had said he was supplied by his brother who worked for the Natal Sharks Board. Tanner co-operated with the officials. He was given a R500 admission-of-guilt fine. The officials tracked Tanner's supplier, Tabani Mangena, to the Hermanus curio market. Mangena denied having told Tanner that he got the teeth from a Natal Sharks Board employee. He said he got his supply from "Jerome" who traded on Cape Town's Greenmarket Square. He said he did not sell Great White shark teeth as doing so was illegal. Sheldon Dudley of the sharks board said: "I'm surprised they're being sold openly in the Cape. Our Great White shark teeth are under lock and key. If anyone on our staff is selling them, they will be severely disciplined," Dudley said. Spencer said the shark cage-diving industry was the biggest contributor to gross net product east of Hermanus. White Shark poaching posed a risk to this industry, he said. SOURCE - Cape Times |
