Hawaii Fish Ban Update

[Hawaii hobbyist]

On the price, what goes up need to come down to reality. I agree it will come to $50-$70 $ ranges. But on the wild caught, if the permits arent exploited and there are gatekeeping, its ok we have them in our tanks. Also given that BIOTA are doing them, it should offset the demand. I really want both the Reefing community and the Yellow tang to be happy and the species is saved.

Afterall Yellow Tangs are the brand ambassodor of this community. Atleast to me which brought me to this hobby.

Just so you know the yellow tang isn’t even threatened. The population is increasing

 

[ryshark]

Just so you know the yellow tang isn’t even threatened. The population is increasing

Any guess on an ETA when we’ll be seeing yellow tangs at the LFS?

 

[SimbaAnto]

Just so you know the yellow tang isn’t even threatened. The population is increasing

Thanks and its means it good.

 

[Biokabe]

Any guess on an ETA when we’ll be seeing yellow tangs at the LFS?

You can find them now, albeit rarely - there has been some wild collection of them for a while now, but not in large numbers. Certainly not in large enough numbers to bring the price below $200. I've seen wild-caught tangs going for $300-$600, with captive-bred Biotas filling in between $150-$250.

 

[luis angel]

The email link doesn’t work. It looks like it’s hawail and not Hawaii is the issue.

It sends me this when I send

 

[vetteguy53081]

CLICK HERE to send an email. (Correct email included)

You can elaborate as much as you like, but be clear in your position in the first sentence.

Click here for a Link to the recent findings by DAR that will be presented on Friday that you can review.

 

[vetteguy53081]

The email link doesn’t work. It looks like it’s hawail and not Hawaii is the issue.

CLICK HERE to send an email. (Correct email included)

You can elaborate as much as you like, but be clear in your position in the first sentence.

Click here for a Link to the recent findings by DAR that will be presented on Friday that you can review.

 

[ryshark]

You can find them now, albeit rarely - there has been some wild collection of them for a while now, but not in large numbers. Certainly not in large enough numbers to bring the price below $200. I've seen wild-caught tangs going for $300-$600, with captive-bred Biotas filling in between $150-$250.

I mean like readily available and not $300-$600.
I haven’t seen any wild at LFS in California yet.

 

[JayM]

I mean like readily available and not $300-$600.
I haven’t seen any wild at LFS in California yet.

I've seen a few. According the LFS owner they are "pre-ban" Tangs, and they were for sale in the $600 range.

 

[doubleshot00]

I didn’t even know it was open

All ive seen are prices continuously increase. So

 

[KevinC]

Other than to be combative or inflammatory, what was your point of posting in this thread then?

You say:

So they've done the studies showing it will be sustainable and they're providing you a report on their findings but you don't want to read the report?

This was not a debate thread on whether or not it should be done because of a "bred vs wild" topic. It was an update on the status of the situation.

This ban to begin with was done without scientific founding, it was pushed by organizations that just believe we shouldn't put creatures in glass boxes. These same organizations would ban all pets or management of any animal for that matter.

The ban did not take in to account the commercial fishing trade (consumption) when put in place, it only went after the aquarium trade which has a significantly reduced impact on these populations.

So again, what's the point of coming in and posting "I don't care to review the science...but if the science says..."?

Edited 4/10 1:06pm for grammar.

U don't ask a vegan why he choose to be vegan. People have preference and he basically just stated he's vegan in a study about meat is better for you.

 

[KevinC]

I'm glad the ban happened. It caused groups like biota to seize the opportunity to develop captive breeding programs for various species. This really needs to continue.
Scanning over the PDF it would seem some level of control should be returned to the fisheries. But I hope that it is restrictive enough to keep prices high and continue to push investments into captive breeding options.

I'd love to learn more! I know they did 1-2 fish here and there, but what else?

I think i seen more captive bred than Biota captive bred posted on Biota's website, and mind you, Bali have been doing these wayyyy before the ban.

 

[Kylesreeftank]

But that’s the thing tho, you’re basing your position off of ignorance. What we have here, is a scientifically vetted, truly sustainable fishery that is one of a kind. It’s all in the reports by all the scientist who work on this. To say this fishery should stay banned is to say you don’t believe in science and that humans shouldn’t be managing or using their own resources. If thats the case, this hobby is finished. Many people don’t realize the hobby isn’t even near ready to transition over to aquaculture and more than likely will never be. There’s a lot of reasons as to why but this is a just a fact we can discuss if you really want.

Please take the time and educate yourself, thanks

Can you please elaborate on why you have the position of never reaching aquaculture sustainability?

This seems like a broad statement that follows some sort of slippery slope fallacy. Just because we can't captive bred all species, does not corelate to never successfully transitioning to aquaculture. All corals in the hobby right now can be aquacultured. Clams can be cultured with a large facility, as well as urchins, surgeonfish, gobies, blennies, angelfish.... Hell, even fuzzy chitons and abalones can be aquacultured.


While I would like to believe that many people on R2R are of sound mind, (and I want to be clear, you are) , you're making some broad generalizations. I think it's best to avoid making them because while in this specific case it was demonstrated there was an increase of fish in the last 30 years of collection, there will always be a study or article that shows the views we would like to see. It's important to review both sides and determine who has better scientific methods, however skeptical we may be of them.


These sorts of fishing licenses, depending of local regulations, be sold, bought, and traded to manipulate the prices of fish. If this is the case, then it makes sense to keep the current licencing in place because it prevents access to the legal path of commercial fishing licencing for the purpose of local food.

The real reason the ban is being pushed is so corporations with way more money than locals can step in and farm them for locals. This allows these corporations to extort the local population's food supply and ultimately potentially deprive them of their heritage. This is fairly common and it ends up creating people who sit on their licenses year over year while the actual fishermen bust their butts on the open ocean for a fraction of what the true market value of the catch is, and then the middle man who sits and owns the shares but doesn't actually fish makes most of the cut of the fish profits.



This all said, there is not any good reason to ban this fishery, and logistically speaking Hawaiians should be angry that this is even getting time on the floor as opposed to actual scientifically proven economic and social problems. They should probably look and see if there's some corruption going on there that is preventing them from actually addressing what their constituents as a majority care about.

 

[BZOFIQ]

Prices are never set in stone. We dictate the price outside of things we can’t control like fuel, electricity etc

I'll order a school from you at pre-ban prices. LMK.

 

[Ziggy17]

I may be in the minority here, but I hope the ban stays in place, unless it truly is sustainable for the fish populations. Maybe another decade of the ban would be best. I personally don't care if certain fish aren't available for my aquarium or if captive breds aren't as nice. I own 3 Biota YTs and they look just fine to me..if that means not plucking them from the ocean, I'm not selfish enough to demand a bright yellow to stare at for my own personal enjoyment at the expense of the YT wild populations.

Are all the fish in your system tanknraised?

 

[jepuskar]

Are all the fish in your system tanknraised?

I'm assuming you are asking that to see how hypocritical I am.

That was my goal, but I have six wild yellow headed jawfish as nobody was selling captive bred. So now I am trying to raise my Jaw Fishes' Babies to offset and possibly turn it into some side income. Not sure how it will pan out yet, but I definitely want to see captive bred JF.

It's an interesting hobby and there are aspects of it that I think are well meaning, like coral propagation and captive breeding of fish that are very worth while to understand, but overall, like zoos...there is just a part of me that thinks it's just wrong. I enjoy my tank, but I'm very self-aware of the selfishness of the whole thing. That's just my personal feelings about it.

 

[Reefing Madness]

And that will do it for the Snarky remarks folks. Keep it civil. Quite a few posts were removed, lets keep on track.

 

[areefer01]

Just so you know the yellow tang isn’t even threatened. The population is increasing

Maybe find a better way to word this especially if you plan to use it in the upcoming discussions. The population is increasing because? Taken as you wrote it Bob could assume it is increasing because they are not being collected anymore. Therefore the population is rebounding.

 

[areefer01]

more affordable prices than they currently are

This comes up a lot - what does it exactly mean and what is the threshold between what is deemed affordable or not? This should not be part of the discussions regarding the continued or removal of said ban.

 

[JayM]

Can you please elaborate on why you have the position of never reaching aquaculture sustainability?

This seems like a broad statement that follows some sort of slippery slope fallacy. Just because we can't captive bred all species, does not corelate to never successfully transitioning to aquaculture. All corals in the hobby right now can be aquacultured. Clams can be cultured with a large facility, as well as urchins, surgeonfish, gobies, blennies, angelfish.... Hell, even fuzzy chitons and abalones can be aquacultured.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I have a couple of thoughts.

Less than 100 species of marine fish have been successfully captive bred, and only about 30 of those are commonly available. I'm confident that there's more to come at some point. Maybe sooner than later. But it will likely be mostly just to see if it can be done because economics and sustainability will be a significant hurdle.

Have you seen Biota's facilities? Can you imagine the financial and environmental cost to scale production to meet the demand of producing 1000's of species of captive bred fish? And 1000's of each specimen?

The math just doesn't math for species that are common and collected in an ethical fashion. It's a different ballgame if we're talking rare and/or threatened species (which is where captive bred programs should probably focus on) as those could likely be done with existing facilities.

I suppose at some point the numbers could make sense, but I don't see it reaching that point anytime soon.