A Shark's Legacy

Lesley Rochat is a shark and marine conservationist, activist and award winning filmmaker and campaigner. She is also a well published environmental photojournalist and photographer. In March 2004 an article she wrote was published in the award winning environmental and conservation magazine, Africa Geographic, about the Maxine, Science, Education and Awareness programme (M-SEA). This exciting shark conservation programme is Lesleys brainchild, and a project of the non profit organization she founded, AfriOceans Conservation Alliance (AOCA), in collaboration with the Two Oceans Aquarium. Soon after the article was published Maxine, an extraordinary raggedtooth shark, who was the catalyst that resulted in Lesley becoming a shark conservationist, and the icon of the programme, was satellite tagged and released after nine years in captivity. Now five years later Lesley has written another article for Africa Geographic, which is downloadable on the AfriOceans website http://www.aoca.org.za.

Both the article and this film reflect back on the very unique event of Maxine's release, and on the release of other sharks thereafter, including the many other successes of the programme, as well as the hard lessons learnt when the team lost two of their sharks. Seldom are sharks viewed favorably, but Mighty Maxine, a shark with a remarkable true-life story, changed this. She became a fantastic ambassador for sharks. The international success of the programme helped tremendously to raise awareness about the plight of sharks, and assisted in changing perceptions of sharks, in particular through the Rethink the Shark campaign, created for the M-SEA programme by Saatchi & Saatchi, Cape Town. To find out more about the programme go to http://www.aoca.org.za

Through the renewed awareness of Maxine, Lesley is asking for support for a petition AOCA is running, which aims for improved protection for a number of shark species, including raggedtooth sharks, and which will be presented shortly to the South Africa government.

PETITION FOR PROTECTION OF SOUTH AFRICA'S SHARKS
Sharks remain a low conservation priority and many species are being driven to extension due to overfishing. South Africa is no exception as Lesley Rochat graphically showed the world in her award winning film, Sharks in Deep Trouble http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo8K1-BVtNw Of the over 200 different species of sharks found in South African waters, only White Sharks, Whale Sharks and Basking Sharks are fully protected. All other species may be legally caught and killed.

Please support the Petition and add your signature, each one counts. To find out more about the petition and to sign go to: http://www.aoca.org.za
Make a donation to support AfriOceans efforts: https://www.givengain.com/cgi-bin/giga.cgi?cmd=donate&cause_id=2532

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• Maxine the shark
• sharks
• shark tagging
• shark releasing
• rethink the shark
• Lesley Rochat
• finning
• shark fishing
• Save Our Seas Foundation
• Two Oceans Aquarium

[damagecontroller]

Great cause, I support it!!

[SharkmanAB]

I dived with Maxine at the Two Oceans Aquarium in 2001. When I heard of her release back into the wild, I was so happy.

Thank you Lesley for the awesome work you are doing.