• Generic shark safety advice is designed for casual, daytime beach users, not regular ocean swimmers.
• Early morning and evening swims are when conditions are best and when most swimmers can actually get in the water.
• Safety systems need to match real swimmer behaviour and local conditions, not just operational convenience.

By Andre Slade – Owner, Ocean Swims

Most shark safety messaging in Australia is built for the average beachgoer. The occasional swimmer. The family on holidays. The person who turns up mid-morning, swims between the flags, then heads home for lunch.

That’s not who most ocean swimmers are.

Regular ocean swimmers don’t dip in randomly. We choose our windows carefully. And more often than not, those windows are early morning or early evening. Before work. After work. When the winds are lighter, the water is cleaner, and the conditions are at their best, on either side of the sea breeze.

Ironically, those are also the times most generic advice tells us to avoid.

View ‘SharkSmart’ websites in your state:

• New South Wales
• Queensland
• Western Australia
• Victoria

The problem with “just don’t swim then”

Advice like “avoid dawn and dusk” sounds simple, but it doesn’t reflect how people actually use the ocean.

For many swimmers:

• Early morning is the only time they can swim.
• Evening swims are the calmest, safest conditions of the day.
• Midday, patrolled hours are often blown out, choppy, or impractical.
• And just as importantly, that early light and quiet morning energy is often what draws people to the water in the first place.

Telling people to avoid those times entirely isn’t realistic. It asks ocean swimmers to give up the very conditions that make swimming enjoyable and sustainable, or to stop swimming altogether.

That’s not safety education. That’s disengagement.

A system built around convenience, not behaviour

This disconnect shows up across the whole safety system.

Lifeguard patrols, lifesaving services, and now shark drone monitoring are largely designed around:

• Peak daytime beach use
• Tourism and casual recreation
• Staffing and operational convenience

They do a valuable job, but they are not built for regular users.

If you swim before 7 am or after 6 pm, you already know this. No patrols. No drones. No flags. No alarms. Just you, the water, and your judgement.

Yet those swimmers are among the most consistent users of the ocean.

The result is a safety framework that protects occasional users well, but leaves regular users operating outside it, while still being told to follow rules that don’t fit their reality.

Read more: Be careful what you wish for, eyes in the sky

Generic rules versus local understanding

Most government messaging has to be broad. That’s understandable. But sharks don’t behave broadly.

They respond to:

• Local geography
• Seasonal movements
• Water temperature changes
• Bait patterns
• Rain, runoff, and current flow
• Specific species common to that stretch of coast

What applies at one beach, bay, or headland may not apply 5km down the coast.

Long-term ocean swimmers learn this the same way surfers and fishers do. Through repetition, observation, and shared local knowledge. Not from statewide checklists.

That local understanding is often what actually informs safer decision-making, far more than blanket advice.

Read more on OceanFit: Sharks don’t need statistics. They need understanding.

The rethink we need

This isn’t an argument against safety services. Or against shark research. Or against caution.

It’s an argument for alignment.

If large numbers of people are using the ocean early and late every day, then safety education and services need to reflect that behaviour, not ignore it.

That could mean:

• Better localised education, not just generic warnings
• More transparent communication about when risk is elevated and when it eases
• Acknowledging that avoidance is not always practical
• Supporting informed decision-making, rather than default fear-based messaging

Safety works best when it meets people where they actually are, not where it’s easiest to manage them.

Understanding beats avoidance

Ocean swimmers are not reckless. We’re not unaware. And we’re not ignoring risk.

We’re choosing to engage with a dynamic environment, and we’re asking for guidance that respects that choice.

Because in the end, swimmers aren’t looking to ignore risk. They’re looking to understand the ocean they’re stepping into, and to make informed choices that fit how, when, and where they actually swim.