Sharks serve as an important part of the underwater community. The image of a shark evokes a deep primordial fear. Ominous and foreboding, the creature has emerged from 250 million years of evolutuion to be considered the very embodiment of evil. The terror and great beauty found within the psyche are reflected in the creatures we find beneath the surface. Man has projected his own agressive shadow nature, his propensity for cruelty and mindless violence onto the shark, when in fact sharks are merely elegant, instinctual creatures at the top of the food chain in the marine environment, just as man is at the top of the food chain in his own terrestrial environment .
Sharks are a keystone species.
The removal of a keystone species from an ecological community causes drastic changes in substantial parts of the community. A large number of other species will either decline to extinction or multiply to unprecedented abundance. The community will be invaded by previously excluded species which impacts the structure of the food web even more. With a species as diverse as the shark, its removal from the environment would drastically impact the global ecology.