Man-eating animals? (1 Viewer)

[pete woodall]

Hi Isurus

Bull sharks are often said to attack humans when the water is murky or muddy, so this supports your idea that they are perhaps not knowingly attacking a human. It's not much comfort to the victim though - a young woman was attacked and died in quite shallow water just off Brisbane this summer and bull sharks were thought responsible. I suspect that they are in fact responsible for more Aussi attacks than previously believed.

I take it that your avatar is of a bull shark - can you expand on how and where you got it?

 

[johnruss]

Well there are the bears Grizzly and yes even black bears have killed recently . Already mentioned are the Mountain Lions. But the deadliest wild animal in the USA is the whitetailed deer. More folks suffer injury and death from motor vehichle accidents trying to avoid hitting them.

 

[Isurus]

Hi Isurus

It's not much comfort to the victim though - a young woman was attacked and died in quite shallow water just off Brisbane this summer and bull sharks were thought responsible. I suspect that they are in fact responsible for more Aussi attacks than previously believed.

I take it that your avatar is of a bull shark - can you expand on how and where you got it?

well I've always thought the whole seal mistaken identity thing can't be much comfort if any to those in that situation. I'm an avid diver John and for one reason or another diving with large pelagics especially sharks has become "my thing" (in fact shark species are the only thing I keep a life list of (stuck on 24 at the moment :stuck: )). The wild bulls I've dived with were at protea banks in south africa where you can see pretty much anything (we also saw two large tiger sharks and schooling hammerheads and ragged-tooths that week). This picture is actually of a baby bull shark (about 5 foot long) and was taken on an aquarium dive in Singapore - there was a "faux-shipwreck barrier" between me and the bull that I regarded as completely unnecessary until I switched my camera strobe on (perhaps due to electrical currents from the built-up charge) when it got very, er "bull-ish" and started making these rather aggressive looking passes. FWIW I've never felt bothered or threatened whilst diving with a wild-shark If you're interested a full size photo and some others are here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/deep-blue/sets/465371/

 

[Hannes]

Thats true - but its not quite what I meant - I don't think I explained myself clearly and I'm being a bit pedantic. Whilst Leopards, Tigers , Crocs or Great Whites may attack and kill humans as a result of mistaken identity they are ultimately attacking a large mammal which is their chosen target and a prey source they can deal with easily. For a bull shark a large mammal or reptile (if you take the turtle analogy) would be something off their normal diet of fish and when they grab people they tend to grab an extremity in the mistaken belief that the palm of the hand or white flat of the foot is a fish if you see what I mean. Hence even the unlucky few bull shark victims that die as a result of their wounds tend to be recovered uneaten.

mankiller? yes occasionally, but true maneater? I believe not.

Yes but Bullsharks often travel in smaller groups, they also tends to hunt in small groups, which means that they are cabable of killing preys which are much larger then themselves, they are numerous cases of that among wild animals, the Bullshark are also ranked as one of the worlds deadliest shark, its a reason for that, if they was almost harmless and rarely attacked people, they wouldent be on that list.


Cameroon also got among the largest denisites of Bullshark in West Africa and still there is few confirmed reports of Bull shark attacks here, and there is generelly few reports from West Africa at all, but as Pete said, I believes that the Bullsharks are resonsible for many more attacks than what currently is known.

Maybe should not be said to be generally man-eaters but they surely are responsible for many attacks around the world each year.

 

[Touty]

Yeah, but the Poms are afraid of Shane Warne too.

The only person 'afraid of Shane Warne' is his ex-wife by all accounts.

 

[Touty]

A few Europeans have been killed or seriously injured by Brown Bears in recent years.

Hello,

Fascinating thread, I didnt know that there was such many man-eating animals around the world, only thought Africa and North America got some.

Altough here in Africa we got plenty of animals that eats humans, even more that are capable of killing humans.

The Nile crocodile is described as among the most dangerous crocodiles on earth, a few thousand (most also eaten) people got killed by these large reptiles here in Africa, lions, leopards, rock python, Bull shark and Great white shark are famous man-eaters, a animal which I previous thought didnt prey of humans were spotted hyenas but apparently there is reports from DR Congo about hyena groups that regulary kill and eat humans, I assume the civil war is the main factor for this behaviour.

 

[Papuan birder]

We got some giant ground-living birds here on PNG called cassowaries, apparently these giant birds are described as man-killers in many bird books (together with swans and ostricth) and to be among the most dangerous birds, but I dont know how they are supposed to kill humans (maybe with kicks?) or how common attacks really are, I have never heard of any attacks at least but as always you here rumours which rarelly is bound to the reality in these parts of the world, these birds is really shy and its rahter the other way around, the humans which kill them as soon as they spot them. You should be lucky to see one these days.

But how about the Tiger shark?, they are described as the most aggresive shark species in the world, there must surely be many attacks made by these ones as well, they are far more common than for ex Great White shark which kills a few dozen each year, only timé I have seen a Tiger shark was while diving just outside Phuket (Thailand) in the mid 1970s, seemed rather friendly then, the specimen was measuring far more than 4,5m so ít was a quite large one.

Piranhas in South America isnt they known to eat humans?

 

[Isurus]

Maybe should not be said to be generally man-eaters but they surely are responsible for many attacks around the world each year.

agreed - probably more attacks than any other shark per year. its worth noting how much more massive they are than other commonly encounterd coastal sharks they are - not long, or fat and yet very large animals.

 

[Rhonda]

Do you have any man-eating animals in your country? Or any animals capable of killing and eating humans? If so, please write something about it here, any confirmed records or possibilities.

I call it extreme birding, some people look down on my friend and I because we rarely get out of the vehicle. When you see the size and sheer numbers of biting insects in a sub-arctic climate and then add to that the Polar Bear which returns as soon as the ice leaves the Hudson Bay, getting out of the vehicle is not always the smartest thing to do. It's good that in Churchill, around the area of the Bay where the big white things roam you can see most every bird from the safety of your car.
Rhonda

 

[lankhin]

We got the Bull shark here in the Philippines to, so at least one.

crocodile and python might also be man-eaters here.

 

[Anthony Morton]

Not quite as exotic as some of the candidates mentioned but I understand it's not good policy to fall over if you're feeding a pen of hungry pigs. In fact I believe pigs have also been used to remove all traces of some murder victims.

Gruesome. Cancel my full english breakfast - I'll just have cornflakes, please!

 

[jurek]

In fact I believe pigs have also been used to remove all traces of some murder victims.

Do they eat bones?

Maybe flock of Bearded Vultures would be better.

J.

 

[snowyowl]

Do you have any man-eating animals in your country? Or any animals capable of killing and eating humans? If so, please write something about it here, any confirmed records or possibilities.

I call it extreme birding, some people look down on my friend and I because we rarely get out of the vehicle. When you see the size and sheer numbers of biting insects in a sub-arctic climate and then add to that the Polar Bear which returns as soon as the ice leaves the Hudson Bay, getting out of the vehicle is not always the smartest thing to do. It's good that in Churchill, around the area of the Bay where the big white things roam you can see most every bird from the safety of your car.
Rhonda

Right on, Rhonda. Most dangerous animals are defintely mosquitoes and blackflies. I'll match the size of ours against yours. I think it's the agricultural fetilizers that make them grow.
Mind you, to be serious, our paper boy and two of his friends were killed and partially eaten by a Black Bear when we lived in Petawawa, Ont. It was spring and they were fishing and it was believed that the fish smell may have triggered the bear to attack.

 

[Isurus]

Do they eat bones?

Not the most authorative zoological source but:

Brick Top: "You're always gonna have problems lifting a body in one piece. Apparently, the best thing to do is cut up the corpse into six pieces and pile it all together."

Sol: "Would someone mind telling me, who are you?"

Brick Top: "And when you got your six pieces, you gotta get rid of them. Cause it's no good leaving it in the deep freezer for your mum to discover. Now, is it? Then I hear the best thing to do is feed them to pigs. You gotta starve the pigs for a few days, then the site of a chopped-up body would look like curry to a p***head. You gotta shave the heads of your victems and pull the teeth out for the sake of the piggies digestion. You could do this afterwards, of course, but you don't want to go sifting through pigs**t, now do you? They will go through bone like butter. You need at least 16 pigs to finish the job in one sitting, so be warry of any man who keeps a pig farm. They will go through a body that weighs 200 pounds in about eight minutes. That means that a single pig can consume two pounds of uncooked flesh every minute. Hence the expression "as greedy as a pig"."

Snatch (1999) Guy Ritchie B

 

[chippingsparrow]

man-eating animals

One is more likely to be killed by bees or lightning or be murdered than be killed by an animal. But yes, all our bears (black, grizzlies and polar) have killed people, especially polar bears. Mountain lions have killed people as well, but again it is rare. I do recall a story of a mountain lion near a British Columbia town that killed a jogger. I know bull moose during fall mating season can be dangerous, as well as a cow moose with a calf--but moose aren't "man-eating animals." Wolves have a reputation from stories of being dangerous, but it's very rare that they attack people. Dogs kill more people than wolves.

 

[Papuan birder]

I read in the newspapper this morning that 6 people recently has been killed and probably eaten by Nile crocodiles in Kenya, it seems like the rivers has floading and the crocdodiles has entered this area now during the rain season.

 

[Amarillo]

Crocs kill thousands every year in Africa - most deaths are not even reported

 

[Papuan birder]

Three women has been killed and eaten by alligators in Florida, in just one week.

 

[SiG]

I thought this was a thread about my wife's family.

 

[MarkHows]

A few people get killed by wild animals and there is mad panic in the headlines, yet people kill animals for fun/sport and it barely gets recorded!

Mark