Yesterday's conversation with Mark the Shark is a sit-down with one of the most polarizing figures in Miami sport fishing — a man who has been shark fishing off South Florida for over fifty years, has tagged tens of thousands of sharks for NOAA, donates his catch to homeless shelters, and will tell you to your face that catch-and-release sailfish tournaments are killing more fish than he ever will. I drove to his office on Miami Beach, sat down surrounded by shark jaws hanging from every wall, and asked him everything I had been wanting to ask since I started following him on Instagram.
Press play in the YouTube player at the top of this page, or scroll back up to watch. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, and iHeartRadio.
Mark the Shark is a Miami-based charter fishing captain who has specialized in shark fishing — what he calls monster fishing — for over fifty years. He runs approximately 450 trips per year out of Miami, has tagged tens of thousands of sharks through NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service tagging program, and donates shark meat to homeless shelters including Camillus House in Miami. He is one of the most recognized and controversial figures in South Florida sport fishing.
Mark runs approximately 450 trips per year, which works out to well over 300 days on the water. Many of those are double or triple trips in a single day — a half day followed by a full day followed by a night trip. His mate Ryan has worked with him for twenty-two years.
Mark tags sharks through NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service program using manual capsule tags. He estimates he has tagged tens of thousands of sharks over his career. He tags and releases protected species and sharks he considers non-threatening to humans, such as sandbar sharks and thresher sharks. He has received recapture data showing tagged sandbars moving north along the coast. His approach to bulls, tigers, and large hammerheads is different — those are the ones he is more likely to kill.
Power drifting is Mark's technique for positioning baits while shark fishing. He faces the boat into the current and manages six baits at various depths — including one bait held five feet off the bottom in several hundred feet of water — while bumping the throttle in and out of gear every few seconds. The goal is to keep all baits in a straight scent line so a shark swimming against the current can follow the scent directly to the bait. The full breakdown of how he runs the operation is in the episode.
Yes. Mark donates shark meat and other fish to Camillus House in Miami and other organizations that feed homeless populations. He drops off fish in the morning before heading out to work. He believes that if a shark is going to be killed, it should be put to good use — eaten or donated, never wasted.
Mark believes live-bait sailfish tournaments are causing significant harm to both the sailfish population and the bait fishery off Miami. His position is that gut-hooked, exhausted sailfish released after being caught on live bait have a high mortality rate, and that tournament fleets deplete local bait supplies by catching and penning thousands of herring and goggle-eyes. His full argument — and why he thinks it connects to the decline in sailfish off Miami — is worth hearing in his own words in the episode.
I have been following Mark the Shark on Instagram for a while now. I am a charter captain myself — twenty years guiding in the Florida Keys — and when I see someone in this industry with strong opinions who catches heat from every direction, my first reaction is not to pile on. My first reaction is to go sit down with the guy and hear his side.
What drew me in was the contradiction. His website says "politically incorrect" and "we don't hang release flags, we hang fish upside down on the gallows." Then I kept scrolling and found out he has tagged more sharks than any sport fisherman I have heard of, donates his catch to homeless shelters, and was the person who blew the whistle on that viral shark-dragging video a few years ago. I wanted to understand where the line is for him. I did not know if we were going to see eye to eye, and that was exactly the reason to go.
Press play. This one is exactly as interesting as I thought it would be.
I asked Mark when he decided to embrace being the villain of Miami sport fishing. His answer goes back further than I expected, and there is a shift that happened about fifteen years ago that flipped public opinion on shark fishing entirely. He calls himself the Darth Vader, and he is not joking. He also is not apologizing. The way he explains why someone has to occupy that role — and why he is fine being the one who does — is not something I can paraphrase. Listen to that part of the conversation.
Mark fishes off Miami every single day. He told me that when they deepened the shipping cut by ten feet, the dredging material was dumped in only 400 feet of water. The silt spread across the reef and, in his words, killed everything. No more kingfish. Almost no bonita. Bait patches destroyed. He is seeing it on his underwater cameras and in his catch numbers. There is a potential class-action suit in the works. The trickle-down effect he describes is something anyone who fishes South Florida needs to hear. Watch that section in the YouTube player at the top of this page.
A few years ago, some guys sent Mark a video of themselves dragging a live shark behind their boat at fifty miles per hour, thinking he would love it. They misread him completely. Mark posted the video, it went viral, and FWC got involved. The part of this conversation that I keep thinking about is not the video itself — it is Mark explaining the difference between killing an animal and torturing one, and how those kids could not tell the difference. Worth hearing in his own words.
I knew Mark had opinions. I did not expect a ninety-second monologue about live-bait sailfish tournaments that I could not find a hole in. He connects the bait shortage, the decline in sailfish numbers off Miami, and the economics of tournament fishing into one argument. He also points out that the same guys flying release flags are the ones pointing the finger at him for killing one sailfish. I am not going to write out the full argument here because the way he delivers it matters. Listen to that section.
Mark has a fighting chair mounted on the outside of his boat, hanging over the gunwale. He has been running it for forty years. The idea came from a Hemingway movie — Humphrey Bogart playing a Keys captain with a chair set far back on the motor mount. Mark took it further. The way he describes what it feels like to fight a big shark from that position, right on top of the water, is one of those moments where the article cannot do what his voice does. Press play.
Mark the Shark is not the person I expected him to be. He is louder, funnier, more self-aware, and more contradictory than his Instagram lets on. He kills sharks and tags tens of thousands of them. He donates fish to homeless shelters and calls himself the Darth Vader. He thinks catch-and-release tournaments are a fraud and electric-reel swordfishing is commercial fishing with a sport fishing label. I do not agree with everything he said, and I do not think he cares whether I do.
I am glad I drove to Miami Beach and sat down with him. The article gives you the topics. Mark gives you the delivery, the volume, and the closing line about tiger sharks that I could not make up if I tried.
Press play in the YouTube player at the top of this page, or scroll back up to watch. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, and iHeartRadio.
Ryan · Crockett · Marabick · Humphrey Bogart
Mark the Shark is a Miami-based charter fishing captain who has specialized in shark fishing for over fifty years. He runs approximately 450 trips per year out of Miami Beach, has tagged tens of thousands of sharks through NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service, and donates his catch to organizations including Camillus House. His mate Ryan has been with him for twenty-two years. He has three children at home and can be found on Instagram at Mark the Shark or at marktheshark.com.
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