Last summer I commented on the (not altogether surprising) findings by researchers that feeding stingrays in Grand Cayman's famous Stingray City makes for fat, lazy stingrays. It turns out that that human feeding and habituation is responsible for the disruption of natural stingray behaviors and an increase in the size of the female population in stingrays. Well, Stingray City is in the news once again. But this time it's not just over stingrays being fed. It's over humans getting sloshed while stingrays are being fed.
In early December, a bar boat was granted a retail liquor license and a music and dancing license to operate at Singray City by Grand Cayman's Liquor Licensing Board . "The vessel will sail out to anchor and operate in the area of Stingray City," reports the Caymanian Compass, "contingent on passing other legal requirements from Department of Environmental Health, Port Authority, Liquor Inspector and the Commissioner of Police."
Needless to say, not all residents think this is a great idea. Natasha Kozaily, a local artist and musician, is trying to build consensus around opposition to the plan. “Stingray City is a natural place where you can go and be with the stingrays in the wild, she said. "It’s a place for children and families to enjoy and interact with nature in the North Sound."
While I applaud Ms Kozaily's efforts, I might quibble over her use of the word "natural" to describe Stingray City. I don't doubt that stingrays originally congregated in shallow sandy flats such as in Grand Cayman's Stingray City. But there's absolutely nothing natural about the daily feeding, handling, and habituation of this wild species that has now become big tourism business. I find it ironic (and more than a little sad) that folks are only now getting worked-up over an alcohol license at Stingray City while the actual daily feeding and handling of wildlife gets a free pass.
3 comments:
I suspect this has more to do with WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN than with wilderness. Though it is also probably not a good idea to stomp around with stingrays after a pitcher or two of sticky rum drinks.
The stingrays were habituated by fishermen dumping offal before it became a tourist attraction. Also, there is the stingray city sandbar, which is a bit of a freak show, and the stiongray city dive, which is handled more like a shark feed (only the divemaster feeds). For the 95% of us ocean lovers who don;t get paid to go diving, I think the dive is a potentially powerful conservation experience.
mark: people get paid to dive?! where do i sign up? i suspect that rays congregated on the flat sandy areas even before fishers created the feeding incentive... ray food is typically foind in infauna communities on expansive sand flats...
but even if the fishers DID initially habituate the rays to human presence, i don't see that as a reasonable (or sustainable) rationale to continue the practice...
people "fed" bears from trash dumps, and prior to legislation in the 80's was quite a popular pastime for folks in bear country to park and watch bears...
until of course we realized that this was all great for entertainment, but terrible for bears... and then when the habituated bear breaks into cars or injures a bystander, it's the bear's fault...
i think the same approaches and lessons learned in these settings should be applied in aquatic settings...
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