S.A.N.F.A. Advancing South Australian Aquatics <*\\\><
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-acn-l at pinetree.pinetree.org
> On Behalf Of
> peter.unmack at ASU.Edu
> Sent: Monday, 15 February 1999 4:59
> To: acn-l
> Subject: [acn-l] NANFA-- endangered fishes Re: nanfa V1 #165 (fwd)
>
>
> Forwarded from the nanfa list
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Sat, 13 Feb 1999 20:55:04 -0500
> From: bockj <bockj at erols.com>
> Reply-To: nanfa at aquaria.net
> To: nanfa at aquaria.net
> Subject: NANFA-- Re: nanfa V1 #165
>
> I'm on the digest, and don't receive these messages individually.
> You guys
> have definitely put out a lot of food for thought.
>
> Regarding the propagation of endangered species in home aquariums:
>
> This is a difficult situation with no easy answers. Captive breeding
> presents problems. The first is introduction of disease. Who knows what
> bugs your newly acquired captives might pick up from your home tanks.
Even
> though you may have them in species-only tanks, bacteria, viruses, and
> whatnot might be lurking in the gravel or filter sponge, left
> over from the
> tank's previous inhabitants. Who knows what they might do to your new
> acquisitions? And even if they don't do anything to your new
> acquisitions,
> they might lie dormant in these fish, and wreak havoc on some
> other species
> in the wild.
>
> Also, there's the problem of inbreeding. Basically, if you keep a
> population together, and don't introduces any new fish, they get inbred.
> And then there's the problem of outbreeding. If you try to prevent
> inbreeding by bringing in captives from some distant location,
> you might be
> impairing the genetic capacity of your original fish to survive in their
> original habitat (if it's still there).
>
> Still, if you receive fish from a place where there's no effort or thought
> whatsoever to prevent their extinction, it makes sense to breed them,
> because, as someone pointed out, there's no alternative to extinction.
>
> I'd like to call for volunteers. You scientific types: can one
> of you (or
> several of you) put together a document that non-academically trained
> aquarists can follow if one of these threatened or extinct-in-the wild
> species ever comes our way? (Has another club prepared such a document?)
> Jay DeLong's article on Salmon breeding is a first step toward
> accomplishing this, but we hobbyists need something more specific and
> tailored to our situation.
>
> While you're at it, you could probably take over NANFA's
> endangered species
> breeding program, which has been crying for someone to take it over for a
> long time.
>
> Best Fishes,
> Bob Bock
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