Challenge: Help The Vet 3

In the shark aquarium, David explained that sharks are not as easy to treat as dolphins, which can be trained to come to him and be co-operative.

Luckily, they're fairly hardy animals and don't need that much treatment, but the baby sharks often do. And to do that, they've got to be taken out of the aquarium.
The reason they have to be taken out of the main aquarium and put into a nursery tark is that these sand tiger sharks are highly cannibalistic, and they attack and eat sharks that are smaller than themselves - even the babies!
So, the Marine Land team catch the babies just after they're born.

They're then kept in the nursery tank until they've grown big enough to not become a tasty snack for a bigger shark.
Stephen steadied the net whilst John caught one of the sharks so that David could take a close-up look.

The power of even that tiny shark was easy to see from the way it ferociously tried to wriggle free.
John explained to Stephen that the adult sharks are even more deadly. To keep them used to a human presence, the staff at Marine Land swim with them little and often so that when they do have to go in to remove a baby shark, the adults aren't surprised.
Gail found further proof of the fearsome power of the shark in the shape of some marks on the water-side of the glass, made by a 2m long sand tiger shark which was chasing a baby.

The baby got away, but the force of the shark ramming into the unscratchable plastic, caused the 8mm thick grazes!
Stephen rounded the day off by helping out with feeding the sharks.

He even hand-fed a friendly stingray!

© The Foundation TV Productions Ltd 2001



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