14 DAY TRIAL // Biologist Jean Sebastien Finger claims that sharks belonging to the same species behave differently under certain circumstances.
He argues this proves that, contrary to popular opinion, sharks have personalities and, therefore, their behavior cannot easily be predicted.
Daily Mail reports that, before concluding that sharks are not “killing machines,” as some like to call them, Jean Sebastien Finger first carried out a series of experiments on several young lemon sharks.
These experiments boiled down to catching wild specimens, placing them in pools and studying their behavior. The young lemon sharks were all caught in the waters off Miami's coastline.
When released in the pools, some of these animals displayed a keen interest in exploring their surroundings, even if they were not familiar with them and doing so meant that they were placing themselves in danger.
On the other hand, others preferred to play it safe, the biologist explains.
Besides, the sharks belonging to the first category, i.e. the novelty-seekers, showed signs of aggression when made to share the pool with others of their kind, despite the fact that they only had to swim alongside other specimens for about 20 minutes.
The ones belonging to the second category proved much more sociable and did not mind sharing the pool with other lemon sharks.
Commenting on the outcome of this investigation, Jean Sebastien Finger wished to point out the fact that, “They [lemon sharks] are not machines, they have personality.”
“You can’t generalize behavior of one individual to a species,” the biologist further detailed on his and his fellow researchers’ findings.
The scientist has recently presented the results of this study at the Joint Meeting of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists. He hopes that, at some point, his findings will help promote conservation efforts.
Thus, provided that people come to understand that sharks aren't the vicious creatures they think them to be, efforts to save them from going extinct could benefit from more public support.