N.S. shark derbies cancelled after Fisheries officials say events don't advance research

All three shark-fishing tournaments remaining in Nova Scotia have been cancelled this summer, a potentially permanent end to annual events dating back 30 years.

This year, Fisheries and Oceans Canada  (DFO) stopped issuing the science licences used to authorize the derbies and organizers cannot swallow DFO conditions that would have allowed them to continue.

"The bottom line is we're not going to be able to hold the tournaments any longer," said Bob Gavel, organizer of the Yarmouth Shark Scramble, largest of the derbies. It ran for 24 years in southwestern Nova Scotia before this summer's cancellation.

"I'm very disappointed to say the least. It has a great impact on the local economy. It brought tons of tourists to the waterfront — in the thousands."

This week the Petit de Grat Shark Derby in Cape Breton was called off as well.

The Lockeport Sea Derby in Shelburne County will continue, but only for mackerel and groundfish.

All the derbies are usually held in August.

For almost a decade, the tournaments have been authorized based on the scientific information they can provide. But Fisheries officials have decided there is no longer any justification for landing sharks for research.

Since 2018 only one species — blue sharks — can be kept. Derby fishing for porbeagle, thresher and shortfin mako sharks have been banned.

DFO said the sample size is also unrepresentative because it includes only a few dozen large, mostly male, blue sharks.

"The issue we are facing today is that the scientific data gained by landing sharks from tournaments in recent history is not contributing or advancing departmental DFO shark research," DFO resources manager Carl MacDonald told organizers according to records of an October 2022 meeting on the future of the shark tournaments.

DFO told tournament organizers a recreational fishing licence was an option. But organizers say bringing sharks on board to weigh, or even alongside to measure, makes catch and release too dangerous for people handling the fish

The other requirement — that landed blue sharks must be used for human food — was impractical, said Lockeport Sea Derby president George Benham.

"If we had say 10 or 15 sharks landed, we don't have a market for 100 per cent of that. It would be too hard to get rid of that many. We just couldn't do it. I don't think any of the derbies could do that," Benham told CBC News.