Queensland kills over 600 sharks in a year protecting swimmers

BRISBANE (AUSTRALIA)- The Australian state Queensland has caught and killed 621 sharks between July 2014 and June 2015 in a shark protection program.

The protection is not of the sharks but against the sharks by the way. Among the 621 sharks caught in this program, there were: 251 tiger sharks, 173 whaler sharks, 111 bull sharks and 8 great whites.

Shark cull?
Is it another one of Australia’s shark culls? Not according to Queensland’s fisheries minister, Bill Byrne who calls it a shark protection program. It wasn’t designed to decrease the local shark population, he said to Australian Associated Press, but “purely designed to catch sharks that are in the vicinity of popular beaches.”

According to the minister the program had bipartisan support and focused on sharks that could injure or kill swimmers.

All bycatch in this ‘protection’ program is to be documenten on a website.