2nd whale shark dies at Ga. Aquarium

[Elite]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070613/ap_on_re_us/whale_shark_dies

 

[Lordhelmet]

i wonder how much longer till they can't "just get another one"

 

[jellygeee]

It's sad to hear that news. Not to mention that the fish is expensive too =(

 

[raddogz]

Wow, that's sad.

I just don't think these kind of animals should be brought into captivity. It's one thing to nurse them back and release, but it's a whole another thing to attempt to keep them long ter.

 

[Kinetic]

interesting the amount of progress in research they're making. one day they'll totally understand the needs of these animals and be able to help them both in the wild and to keep them in captivity if needed.

 

[GreshamH]

I'm with Eileen and I'll even go further on the subject and say I think it's wrong to keep any whale, dolphin, etc in any aquaria or penned up in the ocean.

How many animals are they going to torture to death before realizing a WHALE isn't meant to live in a cage. These things swim a good distance and most migrate.

 

[seminolecpa]

I can't speak for the whale sharks(sounds doubtful), but many of the animals at the zoos and aquariums such as these are animals that were injured or sick and could not be released into the wild because they became to habituated when they were rehibilitated.

 

[GreshamH]

Not sure where you heard that, but IME that is definitly not true. Most public aquariums do not accept injured animals (having sold live animals to many in the past) and seek wild collections all the time. The whale sharks were not injured in any way prior to being captured for that aquarium.

Being I ship to most public aquaria in the US, I'll querry them and see what % of animals they display came from a rehab type situation.

All of that aside, do you honestly think a whale should be kept in a super small space? These guys roam the open seas, not hang around a single reef not ever seeing what else was out there.

 

[seminolecpa]

Didn't hear it, I know it first hand at least in the case of Marine Mammals. I work with and rehab sea lions, fur seals, elephant seals, harbor seals, and other marine mammals and we have sent many of our re-strands to zoos and aquariums but yes they are healthy when we send them out. Pretty sure this is the case for the sea otters and some of the other animals at the MB Aquarium as well.

There are definately still far to many wild caught animals in zoos though some of the research that can be performed can be very useful.

As for the whale sharks .... no I don't think they should be confined in such a small space.

 

[raddogz]

I just find it sad as throughout my entire life I can always remember that whale sharks were scarce in nature (okay not as scarce as blue whales) from watching nature programs.

Seeing that the Georgia Aquarium received two which now have died, and just received two more this is going to be interesting and a bit more disheartening at the same time. For goodness sakes we know we can't keep great whites long term why would you pick something so damn huge that we know so little about it just to prove someone wrong????

Does anyone know if the Georgia Aquarium was doing research hence the acquisition of the whale sharks?