What would scare you more to come face to face with?

[Aplomado]

A wild Griz - female with cubs, or a very large Great White Shark?

[KitchenWitch]

1. Do I have a gun?

[Aplomado]

2. no gun

[KitchenWitch]

6. the bear and her cubs

I lie real still on the ground until they go away.

[Spider Jerusalem]

3. That depends.

Am I armed, and if so, with what?

Unarmed, I'd rather face the shark.

[Aplomado]

4. Unarmed you'd rather face the shark?

Why?

[Spider Jerusalem]

9. A couple of reasons.

The shark is cold-blooded, and so more sluggish if not already aroused by prey or an immediate threat tan a grizzly bear. Also, a large mammal, protecting her young, can be vicious as hell in their defence.

[Aplomado]

14. I see your point there...but

what if you knew the shark was 'on the hunt' and was headed towards you?

With a Griz you might stand a chance of climbing a tree.

[Spider Jerusalem]

18. Bears can run faster than humans.

A human might hit a top speed of 20 mph...a bear can do 30. And running for the tree might be all I needed to get the bear to chase me. Sharks, on the other hand, will USUALLY leave you alone once they realise you aren't whatever their normal prey is.

[Aplomado]

19. A bear might leave you alone if you play dead

A great white may be more likely to savage you, or if it does only take one bite, that one bite could afflict a level of damage that would kill you...

What about just the primal fear of a shark - just a primitive eating machine that once it sets on you it could stop at nothing. A griz is at least a mammal, you have something in common with it. You can understand it somewhat.

[Spider Jerusalem]

21. And if a grizzly came over..

and took one GOOD swipe with her claws out, I could be just as dead. And she'd be able to tell I was playing possum, most likely. Scent, warmth, breathing, heartbeat...all giveaways.

[Aplomado]

23. What if you knew you were going to be attacked, full on

and the only option was surviving the attack, somehow?

[uppityperson]

26. You're kind of blood loving it seems

Of course, being a falcon and all, makes sense.

[Aplomado]

27. lol

yep falcons are predators.

I dig predators. Always have.

[uppityperson]

31. Welcome to DU

[Aplomado]

32. thanks

heads up, there's a fascinating new book out, called The Devil's Teeth, about the Great Whites of the Farrollon Islands, remote rugged islands only 25 miles from San Fran...huge great whites...if you like predators you might like it...

[Spider Jerusalem]

28. Sharks don't give warning.

So I wouldn't know. Just BOOM!, then nothing(assuming it moved in for the kill quickly as it would with a seal). Which isn't a bad way to go, really. And I'd give better odds to my surviving a great white, close to shore, than I would to surviving an encounter with an enraged grizzly bear protecting her cubs.

[Aplomado]

30. check this

"Dave Estment, a yachtsman, was sitting on the jetty at Simon's Town, near Cape Town, when he saw the great white breach the surface.

'It was incredibly fast. The two spear fishermen were not far from the beach. Suddenly a huge shark surged from under the water taking the one diver to his arms in its jaws,' he said.

'It must have been massive to have done that. Then the shark and the man just vanished.' Other witnesses to the attack estimated the shark's length at 20 feet."

http://www.cdnn.info/news/safety/s050605b.html

That sounds pretty fucking terrifying to me.

[Spider Jerusalem]

33. Eh. It'd be over quickly, though.

And how many cases of unprovoked attack, with no blood in the water, are there like that? Not many, I bet.

[Name removed]

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[roguevalley]

41. You run from a bear, you become prey. They tell you to walk

backwards facing the bear and to roll into a ball if they charge. Carry a clicker in the woods. A lot of other things sound like birds to bears.

[Gyre]

5. I got one better.

An FBI agent at your front door, or whatever wild animal you choose.

Don't scoff unless it's happened to you.

Gyre

[Aplomado]

7. It depends on what they want...

[Crazy Guggenheim]

8. How about a bear or

[uppityperson]

15. bear

[BikeWriter]

44. Aarrgghh.............

[Ladyhawk]

10. Do I have a shark cage? n/t

[devilgrrl]

11. Most of the kids I grew up with.

:scared:

[uppityperson]

12. Bear. The shark is more likely to just go away.

Especially a brown bear with cubs. If it was just a random single bear and a random single shark, that would be a tougher choice. No mama brown bear and cubs. No thanks.

[Ladyhawk]

13. I'd face the shark. If I could avoid the first attack, it would realize I

wasn't a seal and go away; whereas, the bear would continue to maul me until she felt her cubs were safe. Grizzlies always go for the head, ripping flesh off the face, destroying eyes, popping skulls like watermelons.

:scared:

This is assuming that both animals actually attacked.

On Edit: wouldn't it be cool to have an army of grizzly bears with laser beams that shot out of their eyes?

[Aplomado]

17. you think you could avoid the first attack?

the young spearfisherman that was killed by a great white, basically taken away and never seen again, recently, did manage to avoid the first pass the shark. His friend was with him. This guy was young and athletic and I guess he dodged it somehow. They were both heading back to shore, scared knowing the shark was under them somewhere, or following them. Then the shark surged up from under him and shot out of the water with the guy in his mouth up to his armpits. Amazing. The never found him. It was a huge shark. Terrifying.

[LeftyMom]

22. That's unusual

Most White Shark attacks on humans are exploratory bites as the result of mistaken identity, and most of those are survived. The smaller subset of predatory or agressive bites are much more likely to be fatal, but they're a great deal less common and what causes them is poorly understood.

I guess that would be categorized as a predatory attack as it's remarkably similar to how a white takes a seal, in terms of the rushing up from underneath.

[Aplomado]

24. There are some predatory attacks in Australia

and South Africa....this attack I just described was in South Africa...here's an eyewitness account.

"Dave Estment, a yachtsman, was sitting on the jetty at Simon's Town, near Cape Town, when he saw the great white breach the surface.

'It was incredibly fast. The two spear fishermen were not far from the beach. Suddenly a huge shark surged from under the water taking the one diver to his arms in its jaws,' he said.

'It must have been massive to have done that. Then the shark and the man just vanished.' Other witnesses to the attack estimated the shark's length at 20 feet."

http://www.cdnn.info/news/safety/s050605b.html

[LeftyMom]

34. I'm not terribly suprised a spearfisher was involved

They suffer a disproportionate number of attacks, not surprising considering they dive in warm waters and trail bleeding and possibly thrashing fish behind them. One might as well send the sharks engraved invitations. I've seen some speculation that some species of sharks treat spearfisherman as they would other competing predators, which would explain the violence of the attack. I don't think we'll ever know the whole truth of why a shark will pass one swimmer and attack another, although we sure seem to have come a long way, even since WWII and the propaganda films where they'd tell survivors of naval accidents to splash to keep sharks away.

I'm curious about the accuracy of the size estimate- I would think that would be rather large for a South African white shark, although not outside the bounds of possiblity. We have them that big here off the coast of CA, but they feed on much larger and fattier seals here than in South Africa.

[Aplomado]

36. They are also lured into the area

by the tour guides. It's a great source of controversy in SA.

Did you see the movie 'Open Water'?

[LeftyMom]

37. No

I'm familiar with the story it's based on but I am not real good with scary movies. Is it any good? I'm rewatching Jaws on Sunday before Shark Week starts on Discovery, I could pick Open Water up too and have a little mini-marathon.

[Aplomado]

38. It's good

it's not based in SA and it doesn't have any great whites in it.

It's in a tropical setting. With smaller sharks, but with many more. Although the guy does get bit by one large lone shark...

In some ways that kind of a scene, with schools of sharks, and different species would be worse than a single great white.

They filmed the movie with real sharks, no barriers, nothing.

[Ladyhawk]

45. Yeah, it would be terrifying.

I guess I would have to hope that 1) the shark missed the first attack, 2) wasn't very hungry, and 3) realized I wasn't a seal. :)

Part of the terror of a shark attack is not being in your own element, while the shark is. Considering the power of a strike from below, at least it would be quick. The bear death wouldn't be so quick.

Where was this shark attack? Was it in the red triangle here off the coast of California? We have some big f-ing sharks--lots of great whites. I'm very interested in Carcharias carcharadon. Someday I plan to do a cage dive with them.

I've heard people describe both bear and shark attacks. Shark attacks tend to be quick. Bear attacks last longer. I remember victims describing the popping sounds they heard as the bear chewed on their skulls...yeccch!

If we're talking prevention, the white shark is less likely to attack than the grizzly with cubs...probably. Luckily, both kinds of attacks are rare.

[Name removed]

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[Ladyhawk]

51. I'll have to give that a read.

Spear fishermen are in greater danger than other divers because if they've speared a fish, the smell will attract sharks. The attack victim might have "smelled right." :( It must have been a f-ing huge shark. The biggest great whites these days are usually found off the coast of California because they've been protected here longer than in other places. After the movie Jaws, the Australian populations were decimated. They are now making a comeback.

South Africa is home to Seal Island, where sharks breach all the time while striking fur seals. If you haven't seen it, rent "Air Jaws." There is some absolutely spectacular footage of great whites launching clear out of the water to attack prey or decoys. Other great white hotspots include Australia and, of course, California. We have the triangle of death here.

When you described what happened to the diver, I could see it in my mind's eye...and yes, it scared the hell out of me. :( I have no doubt the man was pretty much swallowed whole.

[Ladyhawk]

53. Comments on reading the description of the attack.

Hmmm...shark attack clusters have happened before in other localities. I remember the story of the New Jersey shark attacks. I suspect bull sharks were responsible for those attacks. Also, I recall a cluster of shark attacks in Florida. I believe those were mostly bull sharks as well.

There are some who think that overfishing may be at least partially resonsible for any increase in shark attacks on humans. I am very interested in figuring out why sharks attack in certain situations. Really, they are present most of the time in places where people swim, snorkel, scuba, etc., but in rare cases, they attack. Is there a reason we can define or is the shark simply hungry that day?

I'm especially flabbergasted that the shark was shot by a spear gun, yet continued the attack. It has been shown that great whites may hunt in groups, so perhaps it was a second shark that followed up the attack. The idea of great whites as pack hunters is sobering. Until it is completely proven, I think I'll stick with the "lone shark" (punny, huh?) theory. If the shark was shot with a speargun and still pressed the attack, that is something scientists need to investigate. Perhaps the shark was so large it didn't even feel the spear.

Here's a partial answer, I think: "Divers from the National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI) recovered a weightbelt - so damaged that it looked as though it had been sliced through with a knife - a mask, a speargun, a rubber flipper and a buoy with speared fish that had been attached to a trailing line." The poor kid smelled like food. :(

"Dr Robertson said the spear, designed for smaller fish, was unlikely to have caused much damage to the great white." OK, that's what I thought.

As for shark dives causing these attacks, I don't know. Seal Island is just around the bend from some of South Africa's swimming beaches, yet there have been very few attacks. It could be that the chum used to attract sharks has become like a "dinner bell." Pavlov's dogs, anyone? I think it's premature to blame the cage diving industry, but it certainly wouldn't hurt anyone (except those involved in the industry) to stop cage diving until scientists could study this new cluster of shark attacks in South Africa.

As for representing sharks as cute and cuddly...um, I rather doubt that. A great white shark is NOT cute and cuddly. It is an awesome predator. I don't see how anyone could forget those massive serrated teeth.

I saw a study on cage diving with makos that seemed to indicate that the industry did not increase the number of attacks on people. Makos are related to great whites, but they don't get nearly as big.

[uppityperson]

20. zap!

[MercutioATC]

47. You think a great white cares if you're a seal or not?

Great whites are nature's perfect killing machine...the grizzly is just a big mammal with maternal instincts.

At least I'm in my natural element with the grizzly...underwater, humans drop to the bottom of the food chain pretty quickly.

[LeftyMom]

16. The white shark

Presumably I'd encounter each in it's own enviornment, and I'm a shitty swimmer.

[Crazy Guggenheim]

25. What would you rather go up against?

[Aplomado]

29. If I knew a full attack was on

I'd choose the bear, and try and just play dead.

I think just being in the water would be a disadvantage. A bear could grow bored and move on. Or get distracted. If a Great White was full on attacking you I don't think it would stop. And where could you go if you're in the water? No place to hide.

[sleipnir]

39. Joseph V. Tingley

http://134.197.46.69/staff/joe.htm

[Name removed]

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[roguevalley]

40. Bears. We have grizzes around here and they walk around all

over the place. They eat you. I don't hike around here because of the grizzlies.

[Name removed]

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[BikeWriter]

46. Haven't you heard bear shit is full of pepper spray and .44s?

[Name removed]

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[BikeWriter]

50. LOL! Reliably? I know of a grizzly killed by an Alaskan Lady...

with a .22, but I wouldn't want to try it myself!

[Orsino]

52. That depends on whether I'm on land or in water. :-)