White Shark Permitting

The primary objective of the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary is resource protection. The goal of the White Shark Stewardship Project is to protect and conserve the white shark population that uses the sanctuary. In order to achieve this goal, Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary may issue a permit for some activities otherwise prohibited, provided the Superintendent finds that the activities meet the criteria described in 15 C.F.R. Section 922.83.

UnderTitle 14, California Code of Regulations (CCR), Section 670.7, (Permits to Take Fully Protected Animals for Scientific Purposes) activities such as baiting, tagging, and/or white shark capture anywhere in California State waters require a scientific collecting permit from California Department of Fish and Game (CDFG).

Sanctuary regulations complement CDFG regulations and are specific to attraction and approach of white sharks. Hence projects such as scientific tagging studies typically need a sanctuary permit allowing white shark attraction and a CDFG scientific collection permit for the tagging and/or capture. The sanctuary consults with CDFG regarding projects requiring both agency permits.

Activities that involve white shark attraction or approach typically fall into the following permit categories:

The sanctuary is in the process of developing a Programmatic Environmental Assessment (EA) for reasonably anticipated white shark related, permit-requiring activities in the next 5 years. The draft EA will be released for public comment in Spring 2012.