*Photo by Julian Idrobo, Creative Commons
I used to live in Australia’s tropical north where it’s so hot and humid that you long to swim in the dazzling blue sea. But you’d be wise to resist the temptation unless you wish to share the experience with saltwater crocodiles. What I didn’t realise, until I flew at low altitude along the coast of northern Australia, is that the tropical northern seas are also full of sharks. And I mean full of them.
In Greenland, people don’t tend to think or worry much about sharks. But the reason is the same as the reason I never thought much about them in northern Australia – one doesn’t spend much time in the water. In Greenland, you’re pretty much guaranteed of dying of hypothermia in the sea before a shark eats you. Ten minutes will do it. But, like in the tropics, just because one doesn’t think about them, doesn’t mean they’re not there.
Greenlandic waters are home to the enormous, slow, and ancient Greenland shark. It grows to over six metres and swims at far less than an average walking pace. It’s also the longest-lived vertebrate on Earth, estimated to live between about three hundred and five hundred years. There could be Greenland sharks swimming the oceans today that were alive when Michelangelo was painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. But most are likely not that old. Because of overfishing for their liver oil, most Greenland sharks today are estimated to have not yet reached sexual maturity – which happens at around one hundred and fifty years of age. Noone knows how many of them there are, but anecdotally there are indications that in cold waters they are probably still quite common. Fishermen in Nuuk say that they can’t leave their long lines out for more than hour or the whole catch will be taken by sharks. And Greenlanders have fished Greenland sharks for generations – not for their own consumption, but for their dogs. Greenlanders don’t eat them because the meat is toxic unless dried or soaked in milk. It’s full of urea and trimethylamine oxide. But even once it’s treated and no longer toxic, it’s still disgusting. There are some things that even Greenlanders won’t eat.
But Icelanders will. In Iceland, the fermented (read ‘rotten’) ammonia-tasting Greenland shark meat is considered a delicacy. It is described as being an extremely acquired taste. It’s first buried for a few weeks and then dried. There’s good reason that it’s traditionally eaten in small quantities with a shot of strong spirit.
