(chomp)
>I have to agree with the other respondants that most serious aquarists
>will breed and distribute such fishes. I think the key ingredient in
>making this a success is price and variety. After their initial release
>(which should attract a higher price) the cost of the fish should be kept
>as cheap as possible, this will at least disencourage those who want to
>breed the fish for profit. Also, the average aquarist is probably more
>likely to by a cheap attractive cichlid verses an expensive one (an
>attractive cichlid........, is there such a thing? :-) :-) ).
I am a bit more pessimistic than you, Peter. I think that people will, in
the long term, keep and maybe even breed the fish that they like.
Non-"favourites" will always be neglected, however slightly, by amateurs
such as myself, to their eventual detrement. My hope is that enough
aquarists will continue to emerge that have an interest in endangered
fishes, be they attractive Cichlids or useful Desert Gobies ;).
>I think the concern regarding people swapping fish within clubs may
>be relatively minor given how small the percentage is of fishkeepers in
>clubs vs those who are not. Secondly, the larger the number of species
>that can be produced by the African natives the more stable their
>sales/production may be too. Of course the other alternative that has
>already been mentioned is selling only the one sex.
There may be a small percentage of aquarists in clubs - but the aquarists
that would appear to be under discussion here, the ones that work with
endangered species - are IMHO generally speaking members of clubs so that
they can access fish (and attend BBQs, of course!) that they otherwise
cannot get. I've said it before, I'll say it again, the aquarium trade
cannot be relied apon as a continuous source of endangered fishes, at least
in Australia anyhow. They are there to make a dollar out of people like me,
which is fair enough, but of no benefit to long-term species maintenance.
>I am not a cichlid keeper, thus I have little idea as to which species
>you are talking about and how widely kept they would be in the aquarium
>hobby or how "attractive" they would be. Surely though, given the number of
>aquarists around the world, a small sustainable industry could be
>established without so much concern with fishkeepers breeding the fish?
>Presumably they could work on fishes other than just cichlids too?
IMHO the fishkeepers *are* the small sustainable industry... How
sustainable they are is open to debate.
>Please keep the list informed of your progress on this interesting topic
>Les. Undoubtably, it is one of the ways of the future of fish
>conservation. If the locals won't value them, their chances of survival
>in the wild are decreased significantly.
I think that the 'locals' need to be seen on two levels - the population and
the government. The local population may come to value their indigenous
wildlife by custom or by sustainable commercial exploitation (the
"enlightened self interest" hypothesis). The government may value the
wildlife because of a genuine conservation ethic, or by commercial
exploitation by members of a ruling family or clique. If either side fails
to see the worth of the wildlife, then it will go. IMHO this applies
equally to Tigers being poached to extinction in South Asia, or some
"entrepreneur" (ack!) building a resort in prize Honey Blue Eye habitat in
South Queensland.
Regards, Andrew Boyd
___________________________________________________________________
Andrew Boyd - andrew at pcug.org.au - http://www.pcug.org.au/~andrew
"I know that I am God because whenever I pray to him I realise I am
talking to myself" (Woody Allen)