This makes me very sad...

[Reefer831]

I had a buddy post a picture on facebook of a trigger they caught just fishing...it gave me the same feeling.

 

[skinz78]

OK I asked the individual who posted the pic and he told me they were selling for about 1000 Yen, which converts to $12.75 USD. He also said that most of the more colorful clams get cherry picked out of the food bins for the aquarium trade.

 

[o2manyfish]

There are many established clam farms... Do you know how they farm the clams... They take the best looking clams and when they want them to spawn they take them out of the water and let them sit in the sun for awhile. This trauma readies them to spawn. Then they crack the clam open and throw it in the blender to fertilize. Then grow them out in troughs till they are large enough to put in the ocean in fields.

Dave B

 

[skinz78]

Partially true.

They do take them out of water to stress them and induce spawning, and yes they do have to sacrifice just one clam per spawning event to get the zooxanthalle to inhabit the larva.

 

[jedimasterben]

peeps gotta eat...
as long as they dont over-harvest I am cool

Can't happen.

Direct quotes and images from Dr. Mac of Pacific East Aquaculture:

...in French Polynesia, the islands we collect and propagate clams have hundreds of millions of clams and the islands are literally made out of clams shells.

We collect in the Austral and Society Islands, not the Tuamotu Archipelago as is often mentioned. As you can see from the photos, these islands are literally made out of clam shells. The photo on the bottom right clearly illustrates this, a sliver of that photo is more than the number of clams shipped for the aquarium trade in a year, and that photo only shows dead shells, there are miLlions and millions more underwater. There have been studies and there are hundreds of millions of clams in these islands. The locals eat 1000 times the number of clams in a year than the aquarium trade ships worldwide.

Can you find the clams? There are some in each photo.

 

[skinz78]

Links? Photos?

 

[jedimasterben]

Links? Photos?

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=308024&hl=

Also, to touch on the induced spawning - the clam that is sacrificed only donates sperm and eggs, which are then sprayed into the vats holding the clams that are to be induced, which then sense that another clam is spawning and starts a syncrhonous spawn. Once the larvae form, they are free-swimming for a while before eventually metamorphosing and settling on the bottom, which is where they begin to capture free-swimming zooxanthellae - those present in the original sacrificed clam are not utilized.

 

[Ike]

Tridacna is latin for three bites...

I've tried tridacna clam, and I think it was about $20 for sashimi. It wasn't particularty good, though it had a green umami kind of freshness to it that I suspect comes from them being photosynthetic. I doubt I'll ever try it again.

For those of you getting upset... Of all the seafood you can get at a japanese restaurant, a tridacna clam is probably one of the least impactful on the environment. Plus it's not usually the pretty ones getting eaten.

 

[CJO]

http://geniuscook.com/how-to-cook-simmered-mantis-shrimp-red-wine-sauce/

Is is bad for me to say I'd try it? :angel:

Everything we eat is alive at some point. Much of what we eat is also food for other animals so it's part of life to me.

Don't bother. They are pretty bland. I had some in Vietnam a while back.

Also, to touch on the induced spawning - the clam that is sacrificed only donates sperm and eggs, which are then sprayed into the vats holding the clams that are to be induced, which then sense that another clam is spawning and starts a syncrhonous spawn. Once the larvae form, they are free-swimming for a while before eventually metamorphosing and settling on the bottom, which is where they begin to capture free-swimming zooxanthellae - those present in the original sacrificed clam are not utilized.

I'm pretty sure you got that backwards. The stress from leaving them out in the sun induces the spawning. The sacrificial clam is for the zooxanthellae.

This is the manual that most commercial clam farms use for the basis of their programs:
http://aqua.ucdavis.edu/DatabaseRoot/pdf/CTSA130.PDF

CJ

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Wow crazy stuff.

 

[Dsdaley77]

Someone s little while back posed a question about using supermarket clams and such for filtering lol. I ran right up to my supermarket and asked what live animals they had and all were cold water animals Didn't think about the Asian market side of it though and I have two right by me, bbl lol.