Steve--
I agree with you. I was simply answering the question of what they had in the wild that we can't reproduce in our tanks.
Naesco--
One thing that bothers me about a lot of your posts. You often refer to "Industry" as if everyone meets on the weekends and has a big bbq while trying trying to figure out how to pull one over on the customers next week. It's not a big club. Each wholesaler, store, and employee does things their own way, according to their own opinions and governed by their own ethics. There will always be good stores and bad stores, good companies and bad companies, good employees and bad employees. No amount of legislation is going to prevent that. Ultimately it is up to the customer to make the right decision.
Let's take the moorish idol for example. A customer walks into a store and notices a moorish idol swimming beatifully in the a tank. The customer inquires about it and asks to purchase it. At this point it is up to the employee to make a decision to accept or decline the sale. Let's say the fish cost $50.00. The employee knowing nothing about moorish idols other than what it has seen the past week (swimming around like everything is fine) accepts the sale. The customer takes it home and it lives one month before finally keeling over. SO now we deal with the customer's satisfaction or dissatisfation with the "product". Was $50 for a months worth of keeping a beautiful fish a rip off? If the customer doesn't feel so it will probably just replace the fish and hope it can do better next time. If the customer does feel ripped off it will more than likely express his dissatisfaction to the store and then the store must deal with an unhappy customer. As long as the dissatisfied customer doesn't cost him any money nothing will change. He's already got his $50 and the customer killed the fish. If the customer is a valuable one maybe the employee issue a credit in order to keep his business. Bottom line the customer paid for one month's worth of fish enjoyment.
Now as avid reef enthusiast we find this reprehensible. To sentence a fish to a certain slow starving death is "un-ethical". This is where the "cruelty to animals" comes in. We value the lives of these critters and think they should be treated humanely. The average aquarium owner thinks "it's just a fish, I'll just get another one." So we as reef enthusiasts start trying to place the blame on someone.
"That employee had no business selling that fish to that customer"
(the employee was just doing his job he didn't know any better)
"The store had no business stocking that fish in the first place."
(the store owner probably didn't know any better as well, the wholesaler had it at a good price and he felt reasonably sure he would be able to sell it for a profit, the goal of any respecatble business)
"The wholesaler shouldn't have sold it to the store if the store didn't know how to take care of it."
(How is the wholesaler supposed to know who knows what? The order came in the poor migrant worker bagged it and put it in the box.)
"The wholesaler had no business stocking that fish."
(Once again, the wholesaler felt reasonably sure he could sell the fish for a profit, the goal of any respectable business)
"The fish shouldn't have been collected in the first place."
(What is the collector supposed to do? He could either sell the fish to an aquarium exporter or sell it to the local market for food.)
Bottom line: if each step feels that they cannot make a profit on their "product" the product ceases to become profitable and suddenly disappears. In other words, had the customer been more informed the purchase would have never taken place. The moorish idol would have died in the store's tanks and he would have though twice before buying another one. The wholesaler would end up with a tankful of dead moorish idols and will think twice before stocking them. The collector can't take his moorish idols to the exporter anymore becasue no one wants them and he stops wasting valuable time catching them. Problem solved.
Now on to "impossible to keep fish" Obviously they have to last long enough to make it to the customer's tank. So it really should be "impossible to keep long term". Then we have to define long term. Is six months too short? A year? Two years? Should anything less than a natural life span be acceptable? Where did the idea that 3 months is too short but one year is acceptable come from? Is it cruel to shorten the life span of something just for our personal enjoyment?? That depends on your personal ethics and beliefs I guess. Then it becomes an economic issue, am I going to get enough enjoyment out of this fish to make the price and maintenance worth it? Some people are perfectly happy getting a fish (regardless of species impossible or not) to live a month? They have no problem simply replacing the fish. Are these people evil or do they just have a different value assigned to the "life" of the fish?? These very fish we spend so much money to keep alive are eaten in other countries. Our culture allows the eating of certain ugly fish, but values the "life" of pretty ones. So obviously the whole cruelty vs. humane thing is somewhat subjective.
This subjectivity is why I believe as long as the "harvest" can be done in a sustainable manner it should be allowed. As long as we leave plenty of "Moorish Idols" (or any other impossible to keeps) on the reef to make more I don't have a problem with it. As long as the collection is done in a non-destructive manner (i.e. no cyanide or blast fishing). The reef is a resource that we should protect and cherish, but I see no reason why it can't also provide a harvest as well.
Just for the record, I do run a pet store that sells marine fish. I have never, nor do I ever plan to carry any of the "impossible to keep" fish in my store. As a matter of fact my "impossible" list is probably a bit more extensive. I do this for a number of reasons, partly because as an avid reef enthusiast I don't want to sentence any of these species to a certain death. But mostly becasue I don't want to waste my money and profits on something that may die in my tanks forcing me to absorb the cost. I spend as much time as necessary with my customers and employees to make sure that everyone is as informed as possible. We have plenty of books and resources available. So you may wonder why I have a problem with bans and regualtions??? Simple, the cruelty argument is based on emotion and unquantifiable touchy-feely-let's-make-ourselves-feel-good arguments and will ultimately result in more and more regulations intil the hobby is wiped out completely. (Yes even captive bred I think).
If we view this from a natural resources perspective, the numbers and objectives are much more clear. And the hobby will procede and adapt to any changes in a much more logical and organized manner.
my two cents......
Glenn
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