Illegal Shark Fishing Vessel Caught with 379 Dead Sharks in Galápagos Marine Reserve

We documented what happened on July 19, 2011, when the Galápagos National Park and Ecuadorian Navy seized the Fer Mary I. The boat carried 30 crew members and was equipped with 1 long line fishing set with 369 hooks, and 6 "lanchas" for patrolling long lines. When we examined the vessel on July 23rd, they found 379 shark carcasses that needed to be documented before mandatory disposal under Ecuadorian law.

We wanted to answer a critical question: what exactly are illegal shark fishing operations catching in protected waters? While models estimate that 26-73 million sharks die annually in the global fin trade, we rarely get to examine the actual catch composition of illegal vessels. This was our chance to document the reality of poaching in one of the world's most famous marine reserves.

What we found was devastating. Of the 379 sharks, 303 were pelagic thresher sharks, followed by 42 silky sharks and 24 blue sharks. The demographics told a troubling story: 89% were juveniles that had never reproduced, and 64% were female. The crew had removed the upper tail lobes from thresher sharks, making total length determination impossible. Heads had been removed from 64% of all big-eye threshers (194 individuals), requiring researchers to use dorsal standard length measurements and develop conversion equations to estimate body size.

"We wanted to answer a critical question: what exactly are illegal shark fishing operations catching in protected waters."

This single vessel represents a conservation problem. Removing large numbers of juveniles and reproductive females strikes at the heart of shark population recovery. These species are already listed as Near Threatened or Vulnerable by the IUCN, and their slow growth and late maturation make them particularly susceptible to overfishing. Despite the Galápagos Marine Reserve's protected status since 1998 and Ecuador's ban on shark fishing within the reserve since 2003, this data shows that illegal operations continue to target shark populations.

The Fer Mary I was just one of 29 illegal shark fishing operations seized between 2001 and 2007, and three more vessels were caught in 2011 alone. Without dramatic improvements in patrol capacity and penalties, illegal fishing will continue to undermine conservation efforts in even our most protected marine areas.

Citation

Carr, Lindsey A.; Stier, Adrian C.; Fietz, Katharina; Montero, Ignacio; Gallagher, Austin J.; Bruno, John F. (2013). Illegal shark fishing in the Galápagos Marine Reserve. Marine Policy.

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