Is our hobby driving the horror? - Page 6

onereefnotenuf · #**126** 07/14/2006, 05:10 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by KC143
While working in central and south florida it was not uncommen to go to a wholesaler and see several hundred of yellow tangs from indo or other similer species in tanks and as many as 50 dead in the tank. This is obviously a very irreputable example of the wholesale experiance but there are often high numbers of fish and this is one business out of many in the country. "200" is a rounded number but i do not feel it is an exageration. Unfortunatly this hobby starts as a business and a large one at that there are tons of fish for sale right now in the US.

just for arguments sake 50 dead in a tank out of what? lets say 100? which I know is a very high ratio means a 1 to 1 ratio not 200 to one. you factor in deaths from the collector lets say he loses half . that brings it to 2 to 1 and finally at the lfs they lose half then it is 4 to1.I know those three "keepers" do not lose 1/2 of their stock each but just to try and see you're point, it still is no where near 200 to 1. how are we supposed to believe the rest of what you say when this is so blatantly wrong? you say you speak from experience but you are losing any credibility by skewing these numbers so incredibly.

wds21921 · #**127** 07/14/2006, 06:45 PM

Sorry KC I think your argument may be well intended but your message is definitely skewed at this point. You've lost any credibility with me already.
I'm out of this one.
This is more of a discussion of someone enjoying of hearing or seeing themselves in print.

Ciarán · #**128** 07/14/2006, 09:05 PM

Wow what to say after that? Well this hobby is a bit of a hypocritical stance for me as i am a strict vegetarian and value animal life above most other things. So how do i condone keeping beautiful fish and invertebrates in a pathetic glass box? Well its something that plays on my mind quite a lot and i feel the best i can do, short of totally giving up, is to provied THE best conditions possible within my capability for the animals i have taken from the reef. My motivation for persuing shady ideals in respect to my overall character? I hope some day to give back to the reef what i have taken. Maybe not directly in literal livestock but in using my knowledge to promote conservation and to campaign and lobby for greater ethical standards for the ornamental trade and the food fisheries. I love the hobby and my livestock but i feel that our concern should be borne out with a sense of responsibility in making sure the indulgences which are our exotic pets, can live in the best possible conditions. Other than the personal gratification and pleasure i derive from cultivating and keeping a captive reef, i would not do it as it contradicts who i am. But my love for the animals has caused this transgression of self-ideals and i accept that is a personal failing/weakness/immorality to which i say, yeah, i try to be morally conscious but im human after all and like all of you i love reefing. I try to do the best i can conservation-wise, but its still a destructive process and i accept that guiltily.

Quote:

buy a Hippo Tang for $8 and resell it for $35

That is ridiculous. A hippo tang here in Ireland is 65Euro. >$70, I would definitely agree to higher prices of livestock to up the standards of collection and holding facilities. After all we probably spend more on lighting, skimming, filtration, pumps/plumbing aquaria themselves and other peripherals than the main attractions of our luxuries, the inhabitants themselves.

In regards to captive bred or cultured livestock, a very good example is the Tridacna derasa clam. Fished to critical levels, primarily for food consumption in Micronesia/Polynesia, aquaculturing facilities have re-established stocks so that the Derasa clams in your aquaria are very likely aqua-cultured specimins for Australia or Tonga from what I gather.

I think captive breeding and culturing of marine organisms is critical to the long-term sustainance of our hobby i wish that one day we will be able to propagate and/or culture all or most of the specimins we keep, in artificial environments with the eventual goal being a degree of self-sustainance in the hobby itself. Some may retort at this rather lofty goal but i think it is a credible objective to strive for. The moral implications would be tremendous from my perspective, being able to indulge in a quite selfish hobby but without destroying the beautiful environment that provided this indulgence. Though thats only a personal view.

My 2c

Ciaran.

cortez marine · #**129** 08/02/2006, 10:10 AM

"....see several hundred of yellow tangs from indo".... ????

Hard to take the thread seriously with so glaring an error...built upon and passed around.
Yellow tangs from Indonesia?
Steve

GreshamH · #**130** 08/02/2006, 10:43 AM

Not to mention Tonga doesn't AC Derasa's Steve

Just maximas and gigas at the moment. I've requested millions of times that they get into more then just that. They're working on it from what I gather

Galilean · #**131** 08/18/2006, 10:17 AM

Having actually recorded individual records of hundreds of tangs. I can tell you that, at least in the store, they do relatively well. I don't know how many to supplier loses, but in the study I did about 11% of the tangs died before sale. This was much better than the overall losses for all fish before sale which was 18%.

birdfish · #**132** 08/21/2006, 10:56 PM

HI all,

I think the thread title is no more than National Enquirer hyperbole. It is the greatest hobby on earth. It generated
more marine biologists than anything since Sea Hunt.

As for 200 dead purple tangs for 1 live one the ratio of DOA
imported PT's is about the exact opposite of that. That for
the 1970'-1980's, since then in the 90's it is a bit higher,
but not much. Different people are collecting in the Red Sea
now using different methods than before. Regardless,
DOA's from the Red Sea, Hawaii (where Yellow Tangs are really from) are near zero, like Australia. Hmmm all hand/net caught fish. Wonder why that is?

Same with Yellow Tangs. These are fish that are usually 100%
live upon arrival at wholesalers. I've been there accepting them
for decades. Posting mis-information and promoting it is
as fact is a true horror of the hobby. No business could
survive with 75% losses, and no one in it, or that really
knows what is going on would agree with a figure a
fraction of that.

birdfish

Thales · #**133** 08/22/2006, 12:18 AM

I agree that 75% DOA may be over stating, but so is 100% live.

Hand caught is not the panacea you make it out to be. Tonga is all net caught and the DOA is no where near 0%. In my neck of the woods the DOA and DAA on hawaii and RS is also nowhere 0%.
Where have you been working? Things may be different in different areas.

birdfish · #**134** 08/22/2006, 04:23 PM

I have seen far more shipments at 98+% live than I have any other figure from the Red Sea, Tonga, or Australia. I have my
own company the last 15 years so don't think I can say the name here. But I have worked for, bought from, sold to, drank beer with or cussed at virtually every importer in the biz in L.A., over the last 30 years, (but where I no longer reside). There are several Tonga shippers. Mine ships fish straight through LA without repack with 100% survival the norm. Same for Hawai'i.

To respond to another comment here: Tonga does and has aquacultered derasa clams for many years. They don't have any
right now because the Japanese who built and ran the clam farm
left last year turning the farm over to the Tongans, who did not
breed the clams like they were supposed to last year. They have been spawned this year, and in a year there will again be as there always have been Tongan derasa available. They are pale in comparison to Samoan and some other derasa out there though.

GreshamH · #**135** 08/23/2006, 04:27 AM

They attempted a few spawns this year, and they didn't do so well. The seratonin landed late, and Knopp attempted with what he had. One big problem they're having, is lack of feed. That problem won't be solved I fear till I finally get over there and work one out for them their feeding protocals (as per their request...on my dollar

). The clam facility is being half rented, but I degress. Your not the only person in this thread with vast knowledge from working this trade

. In fact, between three of us (Thales, Cortez and I), there's 60+ years combined.

Galilean · #**136** 08/25/2006, 08:32 AM

Do any of you or your customers keep track of what the LFS sells and loses? I attributed (unofficially in my mind) most of the losses I saw in the stores I worked with to the stores, but I would say a typical store will lose 5% of their fish before sale no matter how well they treat them even from the best suppliers. I would assume your 98%-100% survival figures are only counting those fish you lose before they get to the LFS or those the LFS counts as DOA. Every store I studied had 0.5-1% DOA alone. Poor suppliers might send 10% DOA on occasion.

birdfish · #**137** 08/25/2006, 10:53 AM

Hi Galilean,

I do not specifically keep track" but I know that if my clients are
losing an inordinate amount of stuff - from anywhere - they go somewhere else. I also have Fiji fish that are handcaught, shipped straight thru without being touched in LA, (a potential true horror of the hobby if there is one) and can be stuck an extra day en route, and STILL have 100% survival to the store client! Repeatedly. And the fish live. Good fish, caught right, shipped right, HANDLED right, are good fish. There are some bad stores that kill a lot of fish, and some bad wholesalers too. There are good fish out there, but the general public much as they say otherwise wants the dollar damsel. I wouldn't disagree with 5% loss for a store. Meat markets lose a lot more than that and it is already dead when it got there!! I agree with ALL the figures you give except poor suppliers can be a lot more than 10% DOA !! They don't last though.

birdfish

Galilean · #**138** 09/01/2006, 09:11 AM

Yeah, that supplier was dropped after they had the numbers to prove it. They had several shipments with 5-10% DOA and one with 90% dead before sale but this was a large chicago area supplier that has been in buisiness for some years.

I think most LFS don't know what they are losing because they don't keep good records. Some don't keep records at all because the typical assortment of LFS employees just can't or won't do it for $7/hr.

Poor suppliers can stay in buisiness because on any given week the good suppliers just don't have all the fish the store wants to buy. So the store will take a shipment from a several differnt places. Once the fish are in the store, they often forget which ones came from where and can't distiguish the poor supplier. But in general, I would have to agree with you a bad record will eventually catch up with a bad supplier.

vitz · #**139** 09/01/2006, 04:04 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Galilean
Yeah, that supplier was dropped after they had the numbers to prove it. They had several shipments with 5-10% DOA and one with 90% dead before sale but this was a large chicago area supplier that has been in buisiness for some years.

I think most LFS don't know what they are losing because they don't keep good records. Some don't keep records at all because the typical assortment of LFS employees just can't or won't do it for $7/hr.

Poor suppliers can stay in buisiness because on any given week the good suppliers just don't have all the fish the store wants to buy. So the store will take a shipment from a several differnt places. Once the fish are in the store, they often forget which ones came from where and can't distiguish the poor supplier. But in general, I would have to agree with you a bad record will eventually catch up with a bad supplier.

that goes for just about everything an lfs employee should be doing

for $7/hr- all you get is a wisenheimer who expects to just hang around and then collect their paycheck :P

Thales · #**140** 09/01/2006, 04:19 PM

Its not just the employees. I am shocked at the number of LFS owners who don't seem to understand the importance of this kind of information.

Cathy1 · #**141** 09/02/2006, 10:35 AM

A big problem is when people think they can just jump into the hobby without research get fish and inverts and the dont live very long because of poor water conditions and other factors. http://www.tbsaltwater.com is a really great website if you are looking to purshase live rock but are worried about depleting reefs.

Thales · #**142** 09/02/2006, 10:55 AM

I actually think its better to buy live rock from someone leaving the hobby than to buy it fresh from anywhere. Burning jet fuel to fly rock around isn't so good for the reefs either.