Controversy Plagues Oak Bluffs Contest; Scientists, Fishermen on One
Side, Humane Society on the Other
Several years ago the Boston Big Game Fishing Club Monster Shark
Tournament was widely viewed as a simple affair, an event that attracted
top fishermen from up and down the East Coast and generated a moderate
boost in business for local shops and restaurants.
Using charts, graphs and an encyclopedic knowledge of sharks, a leading state marine biologist told the Oak Bluffs selectmen this week that the embattled Boston Big Game Fishing Club's Monster Shark tournament is less about drinking beer and killing sharks, and more about providing a rare opportunity to collect vital information for research.
Large Crowds Gather for Monster Catch, Children in Tow
Marcus Benker, 11, of Holyoke, had never seen a live shark prior to
the Boston Big Game Fishing Club's Monster Shark Tournament in Oak
Bluffs this weekend.
So when he first glimpsed a 321-pound blue shark on Saturday
strapped to the back of the Melissa Kate, a fishing boat out of
Scituate, he studied its lifeless eye, its rows of razor sharp teeth and
its streamlined body and wondered aloud if he was looking at the real
thing.
Like an ominous dorsal fin appearing behind unsuspecting bathers set
to the familiar theme music from Jaws, debate over the Boston Big Game
Fishing Club Monster Shark Tournament resurfaced these past few weeks
just as the countdown to the summer season began in earnest.
Most people think of the shark as the ultimate symbol of dread,
giants with cold lifeless eyes who cruise the ocean looking for swimmers
they can tear from limb to limb. The very word itself is used to
describe people in society who prey on others or who engage in deceptive
practices.
There is probably not an animal in the world more despised or feared
then sharks, ranking right down there with snakes and spiders.
Annual Tournament Held in Oak Bluffs Without Incident
By JACK SHEA
Trumping a 536-pound winning shark is difficult but the biggest news
out of the 21st Monster Shark Tournament weekend for marine biologists,
conservationists and fishermen is that the federal government is
stepping up to protect several species of overfished sharks.
In a return to form of sorts, Oak Bluffs selectmen on Tuesday clashed over what seemed like a relatively harmless plan to allow principal assessor Dianne Wilson to work a three-day work week with longer days instead of a traditional five-day work week.
Although the Monster Shark Tourna ment is over until the same massacre occurs next July, please read on. My husband and I, the two protestors aside from the Humane Society, spent the hours during the weigh-in with signs stating our stance. We have heard many of the arguments that tournament participants and supporters mindlessly rattle off. If those people would do some research, they would uncover the truth about what we are doing to the oceans and the ecosystems within it.
The Boston Big Game Fishing Club Monster Shark Tournament has worn out its welcome, not only in the host town of Oak Bluffs, but on the Vineyard altogether.
It is hard to know precisely when the tournament changed from a sport fishing event to a spectacle on the Oak Bluffs harborfront with dead, bloody sharks hung from hooks for weighing. Some say it was the year the television cameras for ESPN arrived, thrusting the tournament — and again the Vineyard — into an unwelcome national spotlight.
It was 35 years ago that Peter Benchley’s novel Jaws, about a great white shark that terrorizes a resort town, was first published, starting a run of 44 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and inspiring the Steven Spielberg film of the same name, filmed off the shores of Martha’s Vineyard.
This week the novelist’s widow, Wendy Benchley, made a visit to the Oak Bluffs selectmen to take aim at what has become, in recent years, a focal point in the battle over shark conservation: the annual Oak Bluffs Monster Shark Tournament.
