Publish Date:Sunday August 08 Daily Breeze
8/8
By Lisa Cooke STAFF WRITER
A couple times a week, Keith Poe and Chuck Myers stagger home at 4 in the morning howling at each other's fish stories and aiming for their respective front doors before the harsh sunlight can scorch their tender retinas.
No, they're not a couple of dockside drunks. They're mako shark taggers.
“Sometimes I think we're more like vampires,” laughs Myers, producer of “West Coast Sport Fishing,” a public access cable talk show hosted by his fishing buddy, Keith. “We're out all night and even though we don't drink, we do tend to be a little punchy when we get off the boat.”
Poe and Myers are two of about 100 volunteers in the South Bay who catch and release mako sharks for the California Department of Fish and Game. The program was started in 1983 to provide information on the breeding and migration habits of local shark species, including the shortfin mako shark.
A reporter and photographer followed Poe and Myers to find out why two avid sport fishermen would voluntarily spend the night riding 4- to 6-foot swells off the coast of Redondo Beach, knowing they would come home empty-handed.
For these two, shark tagging is a labor of love.
Aboard Poe's refurbished, 24-foot skipjack appropriately named The Shark Tagger the pair are in their element. They work in tandem, throwing out bait, securing lines and snacking on Twinkies and bologna sandwiches.
“We're really lucky our wives are so cool about what we do,” says 37-year-old Poe, who logged 140 nights at sea last year. Tonight, he's on beeper alert: His wife, Deana, is expecting their first child.
Myers, 38, also has an understanding wife. Earlier in the evening, he won the South BayProducers Guild award for his Time-Warner fishing show. “In my acceptance speech I thanked our wives for letting us go fishing,” recalls Myers. “That got a big laugh from everyone there.”
But tagging sharks is more than an adventure, it is also a vital conservation effort. The Southern California Bight, an area from the Channel Islands to the Baja Peninsula is thought to be one of the last remaining mako nurseries in existence, yet the sharks are not protected by law.
“Mako sharks are very susceptible to over-fishing because their reproduction rate is so slow,” says Poe, a muscular blonde who sports thick calluses on his hands, evidence of his carpentry day job. Male makos can't reproduce until they are 3 years old and 7 feet long, says Poe. Females must wait until they are 6 years old and 8{ feet long.
In the five years since Poe and Myers began tagging makos, they have developed an appreciation for the warm-blooded sharks.
“Makos are awesome creatures,” effuses Poe, who has a Web site to promote awareness about the shark-tagging program. The site offers the latest Fish and Game statistics as well as tagging techniques.
“Makos are smart, tough and a real challenge for any sport fisherman,” Poe says. “It would be a shame to see their population decimated by indiscriminate commercial fishing as it has been on the East Coast and Asia.”
According to CDFG statistics, more than 8,500 sharks representing 17 species have been tagged since 1983. In 1997 alone, 655 shortfin mako sharks were tagged, 13 of which have been recaptured.
“I'd like to see both sport and commercial fisherman get involved in tagging sharks,” says Poe, who says he is proud to fly his mako trophy flags upside-down to signify that he releases the fish.
Accidentally hooking and snagging a shark is one thing, but purposely trying to find makos in order to tag and release them is tricky business. Trolling the Santa Monica Bay would make for a lot of wasted nights, so Poe and Myers have turned to technology to help in their quest.
Makos tend to swim in very warm temperatures, within a narrow band of 62 to 70 degrees. So Myers and Poe go online to get a listing of exact temperatures in the Santa Monica Bay via infrared satellite readings. They download the information into a laptop computer, hook it up to an onboard Global Positioning System and head out to sea with a short list of coordinates.
“I'm using science to my advantage,” says Poe. “A lot of sport fisherman don't think there's anything to it, but all they have to do is come out with me one night to see that it works.”
Poe explains his tagging strategy: Once the boat gets to the appropriate site, chum is dropped overboard to attract the sharks. (Chum is a bloody mess of mackerel, squid and sardines that makes sharks go bonkers, “cheeseburgers for fish,” Poe says.) Then the baited hooks go out and the boat is allowed to run with the current leaving a trail of chum in its wake. “Once small fish start feeding on the chum, we're in business,” Myers says. “The sharks aren't far behind.”
Sure enough, at the first set of GPS coordinates, nine miles off Malibu in an area known as the Santa Monica canyon, Poe and Myers hook a 100-pound female.
“Makos feed near the shelf areas,” explains Myers. “That's where the current churns up nutrients.”
Once hooked, bringing the shark alongside the boat takes a considerable amount of muscle. Poe and Myers have about five minutes to determine the sex, weigh and secure the identification tag to the base of the mako's dorsal fin. The idea, says Poe, is to work quickly so as to cause the least amount of distress possible.
They also must be cautious not to let the mako run with the hook too long, lest it cause the fish internal injuries. “We use the smallest hooks we can that are strong enough to hold the fish,” explains Poe. There is a slight tear to the mouth cartilage when the fish is released, but it's no worse than a wound the shark might get feeding, says Myers.
As the night wears on, Poe and Myers try two more GPS locations, the last one just two miles west of the Redondo Beach marina. Here, they tag two more sharks, both slightly smaller than the first.
Maybe because of the late hour, or because it has been a fruitful night of tagging, Poe and Myers banter easily with each other. Despite the serious nature of their quest to help preserve the mako population, they maintain a sense of humor.
“I bet the tagged sharks go back home and tell their friends about the free body piercing they got,” Poe jokes. “Maybe they're hip because they got tagged.”
Although Myers and Poe tag the sharks without compensation from the Department of Fish and Game, they do have sponsors whose donations offset some of the expense. Gardena's New Fishall's and Yo's Tackle provide chum and bait, and Balley Hood furnishes some of their fishing gear. At $30 for five buckets of chum, $2 for each bait setting and $800 for a rod and reel, the costs add up quickly, so the assistance is necessary for the duo to keep their venture going.
Poe, especially, has special feelings for the mako sharks that he tags. “Goodbye, big guy. Thanks. You're a star!” he tells one of sharks as he releases it. “Keith is nothing if not passionate about his sharks,” says Myers.
Passionate, but gounded. “Don't get me wrong, makos are quality table fare,” Poe says. “I'm not a tree hugger. All I'm doing is promoting the idea that we use our natural resources responsibly. If the environment would support it, I would have a freezer full of shark steaks.”
Still, there is a sort of crusader-type feel to their effort, which tackles head-on the fishing industry's cavalier attitude toward sharks. Poe is appalled that commercial fishermen are not held accountable for what they catch and discard and shares firsthand stories of commercial boat waste. “A lot of people don't care that the shark population might be eliminated,” says Myers. Nor does it help that the public perception of sharks fueled by movies like “JawsÓ and the just-released “Deep Blue Sea” is that of malevolent cold-blooded killers.
“Sharks are no more vicious killers than dolphins,” says Poe. That might be so, but no one's every made a movie about a rampaging dolphin devouring beachgoers.
Asked if he thinks his tagging efforts will help change mako fishing regulations, Poe turns somber.
“Realistically, it would take 30 years for the government to draw up management plans and that will probably be too late to save these fish,” Poe says. “What I do may not change anything, but at least I have a voice and one voice is sometimes all it takes.”