Captive whale sharks to become circus act

Written by staff reporter Monday, 30 June 2008 00:00

Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta, the only facility outside Asia to keep whale sharks in captivity, has invited members of the public to come and, for a fee, swim in the tank with the whale sharks. The aquarium came in for severe criticism over its decision to keep whale sharks in the first place, but defended itself on the grounds of the possible research and educational benefits.

A little over a year after the aquarium was opened, the first of two whale sharks that it bought from Taiwan was dead, probably killed by a chemical used to control an infestation of leeches in the tank. At the time of its death, the shark was being force-fed using a PVC tube, which may have caused the damage to its stomach lining that was found in the subsequent autopsy. Less than five months later, the second of the original whale sharks was also dead.

In the meantime, the aquarium had bought two female whale sharks to add to the tank, then, subsequent to the deaths of the first two, ordered two more. Georgia Aquarium points out that the tank is as large as a football field and 6–10m deep, which seems big until you remember that these fish have a migratory range of 13,000km and can dive to 1,000m.

With such a mortality rate, you would imagine that the welfare of the remaining sharks would be a top priority, and that every effort would be made to ensure that nothing could come into the tank that might in any way pollute it or stress its inhabitants. Instead, the aquarium has decided to turn the whole thing into circus-like entertainment: every afternoon, for $190 each, Joe Public can get into the tank and splash around with the whale sharks for half an hour. The aquarium’s executive director, Jeff Swanagan, assured me that they would stop it if they felt that the sharks were being adversely affected, but after losing two of these magnificent animals, it is astonishing that they would take such a risk at all.

Not a great deal is known about these fish in the wild, and even less about how to keep them alive in captivity. A study of the 16 whale sharks kept in the aquarium at Okinawa in Japan showed that, in the 18 years up to 1998, the average life expectancy of a whale shark in captivity was 502 days. Techniques have improved and they have now managed to keep one individual alive for nearly ten years. As more and more grand aquariums are being built around the world, with such facilities already planned in Singapore and Dubai, they will all be competing to have ‘the largest fish in the world’ in their tanks, which does not bode well for an animal already designated vulnerable on the ICUN Red List and still targeted by fishermen, both for its highly valuable fins and its meat.

A man called Bernie Marcus, who saw whale sharks in a tank in Japan and wanted to have the same in the USA, funded the Georgia Aquarium. His money came from starting a company called Home Depot, whose website claims it is ‘dedicated to reducing negative environmental impacts every day’. Can I suggest reducing their negative impact further by leaving these endangered species to migrate around the world’s oceans, instead of sticking them in tanks and making them a circus attraction for people to go and swim with?

If you’d like to request that Georgia Aquarium stops buying whale sharks and instead focuses on the welfare of the whale sharks that it still has, send an email to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it