Sharks! Cristina Zenato, Professional Shark Diver

Cristina Zenato is a shark ecologist and behaviorist who grew up between the savannah and the rainforest of the Congo, where she developed a passion for the outdoors and an understanding and appreciation for the wilderness and our relationship to the environments around us. Today, she lives in The Bahamas and offers scuba-diving courses and shark dives. She is a PADI Course Director, NSS-CDS Advanced Cave diving instructor, TDI Technical Instructor, Rebreather instructor, educator, speaker, writer, and photographer. Cristina is a proud member of the Women Divers Hall of Fame, The Explorers Club, the Ocean Artists Society and a Platinum Pro5000 recipient. The belief that fuels her work is that "knowledge is power and through knowledge we can conquer and defeat unfounded fear to better connect to our oceans and our environment and strive to live in a mutual benefit." Cristina is an active supporter of OWUSS scholars, the WDHOF scholarships and training grants and an active volunteer and diver for the Bahamas National Trust. We talk about growing up in Africa, getting into scuba diving, cave diving, similarities between cave diving - sailing - and mountaineering, shark behavior, spearfishing, a bull shark story, an oceanic whitetip encounter, different species of sharks, what sailors need to know about sharks, the positive role sharks play in ecology, catch-and-release fishing, shark identification, nurse sharks, Bahamas liveaboard shark-dive catamaran trips, the power of one, and more. Links and photos are on the podcast shownotes page Support the show through Patreon