Conservation: Is Captive Bred Fish The Only Way?

[HudsonReefer2.0]

I think the research and development should continue to help broaden captive bred species availability and wild if through carefully managed sustainable fisheries. I don’t think this hobby is the downfall or detrimental to the worlds reefs. That’s for another topic and is a global issue.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

I remember Jake Adams had a take on this. He said something along the lines of "captive breeding doesn't support the communities that live on the reefs, and a better way to get fish is through sustainable collection."

My solution to that would be to place the captive breeding facilities on the communities that live on the reefs.

The key to that idea is “sustainable collection” a number of SE Asian fish are still collected with cyanide. Also, the fishers are paid very poorly. Sustainability includes paying them a decent wage, which isn’t really happening in third world countries.
Jay

 

[Homey D. Clownfish]

I have no problem paying a little more for captive-bred fish. It‘s encouraging in the 15 years I’ve been away from the hobby to see a marked increase in availability of captive bred species. Also, I think it’s nice to see what ORA is doing oversees to have a clam farm in the Marshall islands. I think supporting the locals of these tropical areas will go a long way for a sustainable future.

 

[Mathew0]

I think captive bred is the less cruel option.
Think about it, wild caught reef fish have miles of territory and thousands of other inhabitants to interact with. Taking them out of that and confining them in a tank (even a big 350+ gal) has to have negative effects. We've all seen Finding Nemo.
However, this same argument was made about exotic pets (someone mentioned wild caught parrots) like sugar gliders. Taking them from the wild almost always caused mental issues and many were lost in transit or while waiting to be shipped. I'm sure this happens with our fish as well. Logically, a fish seller would need to catch many more, say yellow tangs, than they ship because many individuals will die in the catching process. Then they have to be bagged and shipped, which will probably lead to the deaths of many more. In the case of sugar gliders, the answer was captive breeding, and was supposed to be kinder and more ecologically responsible. Unfortunately, what ended up happening is that some morally questionable people started breeding facilities in which the suggies are packed into tiny cages and forced to breed to work toward unnatural colorations that cost a ton more. I'm sure everyone is aware of the puppy-mill issues the pet industry is facing.
I feel that captive breeding is the better way. However, that will mean RESPONSIBLE captive breeding. I have a pipe-dream of starting a captive bred fish business. There are plenty of massive buildings around here that have been left empty, like old grocery stores. One could build several very large aquariums as well as smaller ones for fry as they grow up. Theoretically, this could be done cheaper than shipping wild caught individuals halfway around the world. Also, selling them from captive breeding facilities within the US would make the shipping cheaper from the facility to the reefer.
Lastly, the economic impact cant be ignored. Captive breeding will, unavoidably, cost people jobs in countries where having a stable job is not the norm. This is a difficult point, and I don't have an answer for it.

 

[Helter Skilter]

I think the answer to this question, like many in the hobby is "It depends...". Sustainable collection is not difficult as fisheries can rebound fairly quickly once fishing pressures are reduced. This requires drivers to alternate their collection points, and reduce/stop collection of certain species if they see a decline in local populations. The trick to this is teaching the divers that sometimes skipping out on a paycheck today will mean that they'll be able to collect one for many years to come.

In the case of the Banggai cardinal, I'm all for stopping collection for a couple years to allow wild populations to come back, then resuming sustainable catch quotas if AC isn't keeping up with demand.

Price is and will remain the driving factor in the AC market. Many of the fish that are being aquacultured cost significantly more than their wild counterparts, with clownfish being one of the few exceptions. Unless you're dealing with a rare species, most people are not willing to pay more for smaller AC fish when the WC ones are less expensive, larger, and generally have better coloration. As the hobby progresses I think AC prices will drop as we collectively improve practices and more people do it, but they're always going to have higher overhead and R&D costs. An aquaculture facility needs a cost incentive to do the work that they do. Yellow tangs are a perfect example of this. Before Hawai'i closed its fishery, people knew how to be breed yellow tangs, it just didn't make economic sense to do so on a commercial scale.

Going back to "it depends", as long as any given species is plentiful, there's nothing wrong with wild caught fish. If something's approaching critical populations, we're all better off leaving it in the ocean for a while and letting populations recover.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

The key to that idea is “sustainable collection” a number of SE Asian fish are still collected with cyanide. Also, the fishers are paid very poorly. Sustainability includes paying them a decent wage, which isn’t really happening in third world countries.
Jay

I should have added this link that gives some insight into relative sustainability of wild caught fishes from different regions:

Sourcing Marine Fishes and Invertebrates

. Sourcing Marine Fishes and Invertebrates Experienced aquarists are aware that fishes from different regions of the world can have different levels of sustainability when acquired for their aquariums. The reasons for these differences may...

www.reef2reef.com

I fully understand that home aquarists don't always have good information from their dealers as to the sources of their fish, but this may help if you DO know.

Jay

 

[JBreefer]

Captive bred fish are the future of the hobby. Wild caught fish are available now but that may not be the case forever. Indonesia shut down for a number of months a few years ago and then reopened. There's no guarantee that it will remain open. I don't think the Hawaii fishery will ever reopen. Over time more species will become captive bred and the numbers produced will grow exponentially. That will bring the price down.

The community impact and responsible captive breeding are important and it’s going to be very interesting to see where fish collection goes. Right now, the disease, acclimation and feeding of the fish are most important and I think captive bred are the way to go if you can. I have yet to branch out to more finicky captive bred fish (Regal, mandarin) but the captive bred fish I’ve bought have had 100% success rate and that’s important to me.

 

[JPM San Diego]

When we started we needed herbivores and bought a Tomini Tang, a Kole Tang, and a Foxface. About two years later we launched our 200 gallon waterbox aquarium. My wife and I decided to buy captive bred fish whenever possible. Fast forward several months and the sand bed needed someone to give it a stir. We decided when a particular niche fish is needed, and a captive bred option is not available, then we would go wild caught. Diamond gobies fit the bill. It would be great if ORA, Biota, etc. expanded the options for reef safe fish and also utilitarian fish.

 

[firechild]

If I have the option for captive vs wild, I’d usually go captive. There are some fish, however, that simply do not yet appear as captive bred fish, and that won’t stop me from wanting said fish. Hopefully the day soon comes where all of our fish and corals are captive, but that can’t happen unless our wild ones breed for us.
Though, if all of our fish are irresponsibly bred (heavy inbreeding), there will be a large decrease in quality of our fish. You see this with many freshwater fish, especially livebearers and cichlids, where the captive strains often look worse and aren’t nearly as healthy as the wild individuals.

This is a big part of it for me. I'm not familiar with what is commonly available in the US and other parts of the world but in Australia, we're in a bit of a bubble. Captive bred marine fish are prohibited from being imported, that means all our captive bred fish are home grown. Like most parts of the industry, the almighty dollar is #1 and breeders would prefer to pump out thousands of fish than to breed quality fish. The vast majority of clownfish I see are captive bred (which I think is a great thing) but it also means that most of them are either mis-barred or some horrible genetic mess (like longfins, snowflakes, picassos, etc). This seems to be less of an issue for other species such as dottybacks, cardinals, mandarins, etc but just because the genetic issues are not as obvious as they are on a fish that is supposed to have 3 well defined white stripes, doesn't mean the genetic issues don't exist and I have little faith that the breeders have any concern about the long term issues with their stock.

 

[Sump Crab]

I personally prefer wild caught fish.

 

[Gatorpa]

One day, ALL wild caught marine life will be banned. Captive bred EVERYTHING is the future of the hobby.

I doubt that. There are too many fish in the sea and too many places that will allow it.

Take the Red Snapper fishery in the Atlantic, it was closed for about 10 years, now the fishery has rebounded so well its almost impossible to not catch them, same with many sharks in the Atlantic.

Nature finds a way.

 

[Homey D. Clownfish]

I doubt that. There are too many fish in the sea and too many places that will allow it.

Take the Red Snapper fishery in the Atlantic, it was closed for about 10 years, now the fishery has rebounded so well its almost impossible to not catch them, same with many sharks in the Atlantic.

Nature finds a way.

“Nature finds a way.”

Did you get that quote from Jurassic Park? Lol!

 

[Brucealmighty]

Some places around the world already have an amazing technology to breed said marine organisms, almost like an ocean farm, its a shame we don't have a communication system in place where people can swap ideas for the conservation of our oceans, and people who do such good work could perhaps share the systems they use etc to be successful

 

[Sump Crab]

I doubt that. There are too many fish in the sea and too many places that will allow it.

Take the Red Snapper fishery in the Atlantic, it was closed for about 10 years, now the fishery has rebounded so well its almost impossible to not catch them, same with many sharks in the Atlantic.

Nature finds a way.

Most likely they will ban all harvests from the ocean by us. The governments and elites will allow mega corporations or government agencies to harvest as much as they would like but all of us, the peon’s, will be put in our place. The writing is on the wall, some day it will be illegal to fish, hunt, and probably to even garden.

 

[ReefStash Verified Sponsor]

Definitely not the only way but I personally chose to do only captive bred fish from a single source in order to limit the variables of diseases being introduced into my tank. I’ve done systems in the past with a strict quarantine regimen and just wasn’t up for it with this build. I also see captive bred as a way of the future for our hobby… at some point I believe we will see even greater controls over importing wildlife and I have enjoyed learning more about the fish available to me through the efforts of companies like Biota.

Here’s a live web cam of my mixed reef tank from the other day. All fish are captive bred from Biota.

 

[Reef Outfit]

I doubt that. There are too many fish in the sea and too many places that will allow it.

Take the Red Snapper fishery in the Atlantic, it was closed for about 10 years, now the fishery has rebounded so well its almost impossible to not catch them, same with many sharks in the Atlantic.

Nature finds a way.

I didn't mean availability, just the sheer respect for every life form.

I'm talking about evolution.

Yes, it will take much longer than all the discussion about availability...

Catching any form of life for captivity, for profit or display is wrong. Humans will even catch humans for profit let alone defenseless fish. I wouldn't even agree 100% on captive-bred if not required for that species survival. Animals go extinct naturally also, so I'm not sure if maintaining a species bred in captivity when not available in the wild would be the right thing to do either.

Lets just say that at this point captive-bred is less wrong than wild caught.

 

[Gatorpa]

I didn't mean availability, just the sheer respect for every life form.

I'm talking about evolution.

Yes, it will take much longer than all the discussion about availability...

Catching any form of life for captivity, for profit or display is wrong. Humans will even catch humans for profit let alone defenseless fish. I wouldn't even agree 100% on captive-bred if not required for that species survival. Animals go extinct naturally also, so I'm not sure if maintaining a species bred in captivity when not available in the wild would be the right thing to do either.

Lets just say that at this point captive-bred is less wrong than wild caught.

I’m guessing since you feel so strongly you have no fish or invertebrates in your system…

 

[Hans-Werner]

I have a question that might fit in here, maybe someone or @Jay Hemdal can answer it: Would a more sustainable collection of fish be possible with better narcotics like Tricaine or clove oil instead of cyanide, like it still seems to be used, according to Jay's article.

What prevents the use of better narcotics for collecting wild caught fish that are hard to catch? Price? Efficiency?

I understand that the use of better narcotics may not be the best way but maybe a better way?

 

[Sump Crab]

I didn't mean availability, just the sheer respect for every life form.

I'm talking about evolution.

Yes, it will take much longer than all the discussion about availability...

Catching any form of life for captivity, for profit or display is wrong. Humans will even catch humans for profit let alone defenseless fish. I wouldn't even agree 100% on captive-bred if not required for that species survival. Animals go extinct naturally also, so I'm not sure if maintaining a species bred in captivity when not available in the wild would be the right thing to do either.

Lets just say that at this point captive-bred is less wrong than wild caught.

Im sorry but if it’s wrong to keep fish in an aquarium then it’s wrong whether they are captive bred or not.

 

[firechild]

I have a question that might fit in here, maybe someone or @Jay Hemdal can answer it: Would a more sustainable collection of fish be possible with better narcotics like Tricaine or clove oil instead of cyanide, like it still seems to be used, according to Jay's article.

What prevents the use of better narcotics for collecting wild caught fish that are hard to catch? Price? Efficiency?

I understand that the use of better narcotics may not be the best way but maybe a better way?

Cyanide is used because it has no visible negative effects for long enough that the fish can make their way through the supply chain before dying inexplicably in a home aquarium or retail store if they are there long enough. These people aren't concerned about using less harmful chemicals, they are all about maximising profits.