After Massachusetts fishermen were seen 'targeting' white sharks, state looks to better restrict shore-based shark fishing

Rick Sobey, Boston Herald on Mar 20, 2025

Published in Science & Technology News

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BOSTON — It’s already illegal for fishermen to attract or capture a great white shark, but Bay State officials are proposing new rules to better restrict shore-based shark fishing after anglers were seen “targeting” the protected species along Cape Cod.

The white shark fishing issue came to a head last September when fishermen at a Wellfleet beach reportedly used a drone to drop bait near surfers to lure a white shark.

While this reported fishing activity violated the existing white shark rules, Massachusetts Environmental Police have had a tough time enforcing the regulations because it’s difficult to prove intent — and anglers will often claim they’re targeting other species of sharks, striped bass, or bluefish.

As a result, the state Division of Marine Fisheries is pitching more straightforward rules that would control white shark fishing to help with enforcement.

The regulations would ban shore-based shark fishing along the Massachusetts coast where white sharks are common, prohibit chumming when conducting any shore fishing, and limit the launching of baits to normal casting when shore fishing.

These rules would be in place along the Massachusetts coastline from the New Hampshire border through Chatham, including all of Monomoy Island, except for the shores inside Plymouth, Kingston, and Duxbury Bays.

“There have been increasing reports of people fishing for sharks from beaches, especially along the Outer Cape,” Megan Winton of the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy told the Herald. “We’re very supportive of the proposed regulations… They would be a step in the right direction.”

The waters along the South Cape and Islands, where recreational shark fishing for non-white shark species has historically occurred, are not included in the proposal.

Also, the state would exempt the shoreline inside the Three Bays system because there’s a traditional shore-based catch and release sand tiger shark fishery there.

Back in 2015 as Cape Cod was becoming a white shark hotspot, the state enacted emergency rules to address public safety concerns. The existing state regulations restrict the ability for fishers to target white sharks, and it’s illegal to attract or capture a white shark without authorization from the DMF director.

The state agency has limited the growth of activities that would put humans in contact with white sharks — like baited cage diving — but some shore-based anglers have been targeting and landing white sharks.

“They’ll post their video on social media because there are no bigger bragging rights,” Winton said.

Then the infamous incident happened at a Wellfleet beach last September, which the Provincetown Independent brought to light. Shore-based anglers were reportedly targeting sharks and were chumming off the beach, using drones to deploy baits, and doing so among a group of surfers.

The surfers claimed to have seen surfacing white sharks while in the water, and that they were “clotheslined” by the fishing gear. The fishermen suggested the surfers were intentionally interacting with the fishing gear, and claimed they were fishing for sharks other than whites.

“That incident put these regulations on everybody’s radar,” Winton said. “And raised this issue up the flagpole.”

The head of the Marine Fisheries Advisory Commission said he’s worried about the potential for shore-based shark fishing to expand.

“My concern is driven by both general interest in this animal and the substantial social media interest around shore-based shark fishing,” wrote Daniel McKiernan, director of the Marine Fisheries Advisory Commission. “Should this growth occur, it would substantially increase the risks to both the public and to white sharks.

“In response, DMF has developed a series of proposals that I view as being commonsense steps to make the existing regulatory framework more enforceable and constrain burgeoning fishing activities that may potentially lead to intended or unintended interactions with white sharks resulting in harm to the animal and a public safety risk,” he added. “My proposals are also informed by existing regulations in other jurisdictions with traditional shore-based shark fisheries, including New York and Florida.”

The state is proposing many other commercial and recreational fishing regulations.

The proposed amendments include: total length measurement and commercial size limits in the striped bass fishery; catch limits for false albacore and Atlantic bonito; commercial menhaden trip limit triggers and permitting; commercial summer flounder seasonal allocations; retention of oceanic whitetip sharks; documentation to possess or sell dogfish fins; and more.

The Marine Fisheries Advisory Commission is expected to vote on final DMF recommendations at their business meeting next week.

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