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the United States if an animal is considered endangered we
have laws against killing them. A violation of those laws could
result in jail time and a fine. Furthermore, we have many
national parks around the country that can help endangered
animals and give them a natural refuge in which they may
hopefully prosper. But, for sharks and other sea creatures, it
is more difficult to keep them safe. Even though there are
aquatic wildlife preserves around the world, sea life can simply
move in and out of the boundaries of the preserve at any time.
Many land animals are frightened to enter our heavily
populated areas, because they are frightened of the noise, or
the presence of people in those areas. For a shark there are no
warning signs that they could be entering dangerous nonregulated waters.
Can the sharks flourish once again?
Most likely, for some of the endangered species of shark it
will be too late to save them. One species that is already at a
dangerously low level is the hammerhead, of which Rosenthal
(2011) states, “The presence of the once-common hammerhead
in large parts of the western Atlantic… has decreased by up to
89 percent over the last 25 years” (para. 5). The task for