Floods attract sharks

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Flooding around the Tweed

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BULL sharks love a good flood, a marine expert has warned.

Doctor Daniel Bucher, a senior lecturer in marine and fisheries biology at Southern Cross University, said bull sharks were one of nature’s winners after a flood.

“It is a time when the bull sharks in particular are looking for food, so it is not a good time to be swimming, particularly near a river mouth,” Dr Bucher said.

“If the water is dirty, you don’t want to swim over chest height.”

The bull shark has aggressive and unpredictable behaviour and is responsible for many attacks on humans.

Marine Watch director Greg Leigh-Smith said the last significant shark sighting was two 2.5m hammerheads swimming about 20m away from surfers at Greenmount on Friday.

Mr Leigh-Smith said he wouldn’t like to have his legs dangling over a surf board in the current murky water conditions.