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| Sharks and Rays of Southern California DVD |
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Author |
: CDN |
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Date |
: January 30, 2009 |
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Dr. Bill Bushing recently released a two disk DVD entitled Sharks and Rays of Southern California. Humans have probably feared sharks in California waters since the first aboriginal had a foot bitten while fishing from his canoe. They have far more to fear from us since humans kill up to 100 million sharks a year compared to their measly average toll of 5-10 human fatalities annually.
Long misunderstood, due in part to movies like "Jaws" and television programs like "Shark Week," these cartilaginous fishes are important members of global ecosystems. The tremendous reductions in their numbers world-wide due to gill netting, long-lining and other targeted catch techniques for shark fin soup or other food, and as by catch in fisheries for other target species has caused serious imbalance and degradation in ecosystems from tropical coral reefs to icy polar seas.
This two-disc DVD set introduces the viewer to the natural history of most of the common species in Southern California. It includes 2 1/2 hours of video footage covering the sharks and rays in seven different 22-minute episodes. Rays include the electric or torpedo ray, round stingray, thornback ray, shovelnose guitarfish and bat ray. Featured sharks are the horn, swell, angel, leopard, soupfin, blue, mako and (from the safety of a cage off Guadalupe Island) the great white! The four episodes on sharks are contained on one of the discs and the three episodes on rays on the second disc.
The natural history of each species is covered including diagnostic features, distribution, feeding behavior and reproductive behavior where possible.
Further information on this and other educational underwater DVD's can be found at www.StarThrower.org.
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