A little confused, Who here justifies this hobby?

[aerie2008]

To justify something means you did something wrong in the first place.

I try not to do anything wrong, e. g. I am not buying anything wild-caught, or anything that won´t reproduce on its own accord in my tank. The only exception is the live rock.

I plan to keep this up even if I upgrade to a larger tank later.

Now if you asked me if anything useful came of me having that little reef - I´d have to admit that my son finds it quite hilarious to see me sit with a book, trying to cram all the reef-related chemistry into my brain, cursing loudly about not having paid attention when I was back in school, simply because I thought "I am never going to need this **** again".

The funny part is - I actually didn´t need it again. Until I decided to keep a reef at home.

So, what my son learns from this is, among other things: Pay attention at school, even if you consider it boring at the moment. You simply don´t know when and if the knowledge will come in handy later in your life.

 

[ocdreefer]

hey we are all going to die anyway. Who cares. yea our children are still going to be here blah blah blah. We (humans) are our own worst enemy.

 

[Daemonfly]

The responsible reefkeepers aren't the problem, it's the bad LFSs & irresponsible people that do much of the damage. Sure, you might add to the overall demand, but probably small change when compared.

 

[Michael]

if newcommers spent more time reading up first before filling a 3 week old tank with nems, fish and corals the losses would reduce, also with the success rates with fragging and tank breeding now i think we can justify the hobby, were taking less than before, hopefully new methods of this and constant discussion between reefers on forums like this will rapidly reduce whats taken from the oceans as new discoveries with breeding and propagating are spread from reefer to reefer.

i think today in this century we can justify our hobby 1000 times more than we could just 15 years ago.

 

[aerie2008]

"if newcommers spent more time reading up first before filling a 3 week old tank with nems, fish and corals."

Exactly.

On the other hand - many of the FW fish and invertebrates we keep nowadays, and which are easy to breed nowadays as well, and are therefore widely available, started out as rare and delicate first-time imports. It is mostly due to the efforts of a few enthusiasts that we are where we are today.

I think private SW aquarists have potential there as well. If more people who keep SW fish/invertebrates tried at least once in a while to raise fry, much could be learned, and catching wild specimens would become less necessary, enough time given.

 

[iamwrasseman]

yes great point and the store im affiliated with does just that .they will not sell you to many fish at a time or throughout the begining weeks/months .they keep track of purchases and try to educate and limit newbies . there have been so many time that i have heard "no i'm not selling you that fish or coral because you need to slow down ".what happens often though is that the purchaser goes to another LFS and overloads their tank .it usually gets back to us and we cant controll that end of it .

 

[Rensmif]

I am just curious does anyone here actually think our hobby contributes any sort of benefit? If so could you explain your position how we are helping?


I think it would be awesome if a gigantic fish could put me in lets say just my bed room, with a bed and thats it. With a jack hammer constantly going off outside of my room. Oh and my bed is a single.. one of those singles that your feet hang off of and a few springs poking in my back. And I am fed a nice diet of 4 different kinds of "nutri-system" ie. cardboard with water\salt\cornstarch for a sauce.

The hobby soothes me as a human being and we as humans have dominion over the animals. - thats the way it is

 

[iamwrasseman]

yes i agree and it also facilitates the research and education of these certain species because if it wasn't for the trade i think they wouldn't really care about them as much and there would be no information available .

 

[chino402]

this hobby take too much time... so i don't drink and go party as much any more... i think "HOBBY" means entertainment... it's just like playing a sport, fishing...

 

[arresife]

I am not a hippy, In fact I think aliens are growing us here to harvest us and eat, so I do not care too much about "earth" [/QUOTE]

O my bad I thought they just like probing our buts

 

[kraut3253]

Aside from enjoying reef keeping, I am also an avid reef tourist. I really enjoy snorkelling on a reef and marveling at the diversity of amazing creatures. To my untrained eye collection impact was not noticible compared to die-off from high nutrients/siltation, high intensity storms, and high water temperatures. Damage from boats and tourists that stand on the coral has also been heavy where I have been.
Besides that if the guy harvesting the corals of reef can no longer make money at that, he will have to look at his limited options to find some other way to feed his family. His other options are much more likely to include clearcutting tropical hardwoods or tuna fishing than eco-tourism.
I buy captive raised frags and frag my own corals not because I believe that it is saving a reef somewhere, but because it just makes more sense. There're cheaper, hardier and usually not that hard to get.
Don't get me wrong, I do try to maintain a minimal environmental footprint, I just think that most wild coral harvesting ranks pretty low on the environmental impact scale when compared to the other factors effecting reefs.

 

[iamwrasseman]

i totally agree with the environmental impact statement at the end . we are taking but there are much worse things going on that really are having a huge impact on the reefs .

 

[GTR]

So because the hobby impact is less that makes it OK?

SteveU

 

[NaClH2Opgh]

So because the hobby impact is less that makes it OK?

SteveU

So if it impacts it at all then we are wrong and stop what we are doing? Not sure I follow.

 

[iamwrasseman]

what we are "removing"from the reef will be kept and corals propagated well beyond when the reefs are gone so we are going to be keeping alive what would have vanished when the reefs disappear which isn't that far off in the grand scheme of things .the few fish that are bred in captivity are growing every day as knowledge in this area is ever expanding .you have to understand that the reefs are doomed as excessive human life and the waste that comes from us and our factories etc has really begun to take its toll on the ocean as well as the entire world.

 

[CWP]

Watch the Blue Planet on Discovery. They have a great episode concerning the reefs. One storm destroys hundreds of tons of coral, and yet they thrive. One school of Convict Tangs can wipe out all of the stony coral in a reef the size of an acre in minutes. In fact, they show footage of it happening. I, for one, do not believe that this hobby will destroy the reefs. However, if what some scientists say concerning global warming and the acidification of the oceans by greenhouse gasses is true, those forces may destroy the reefs. I use my tank to educate my friends and families about the beauty of the reefs, and how fragile they are. I don't consider myself a part of the problem. If I am, I am one of six billion.

 

[mstrpln03]

My tanks are like a Zen Garden to me, they're my therapy. The hobby is not as damaging to the reefs as:

Rising ocean temperatures

Ocean acidification

Desalinization

Toxic dust blowing off the Sahara Desert and settling on reefs as far away as the Caribbean

Just to name a few.

Scientists are saying they could be all gone in nature in 50 years. If humanity can find a way to remedy the situation, it could well be that the seed stock to replenish the reefs will come from coral farms, or even our tanks.

Certain corals are believed to hold chemical components that could cure diseases.

I see nothing wrong with responsible reef keeping.

 

[pciscott]

Energy conservation, carbon footprint, Global warming, these are all words that bring out passions that fuel the politicians and Scientists to gain grants and come up with more bureaucracy. Does Nascar save Energy, does the TV you watch save energy, does the car you drive save energy, does the computer you are reading now save energy, what is going on in our world is directly related to the population and unless we find better birth control species are going to go away. I think propagation through hobbyists is a positive and when the ocean covers two thirds of our world I think the reefs have a better chance than many others. I am building a new system with all the new bells and whistles to save energy and have perfect water quality and the money I am spending is feeding our economy. So unless you want to go off the electric grid, trade your car in for a bike, and grow your own food you my friend are part of the problem just like the rest of us. I spend more time at home because of this hobby and I think flying to Australia to see the coral reef might just be the same as owning a piece of the reef in the carbon footprint department. The enjoyment my reef brings to my family and the feeling I get when I trade a piece of homegrown colored sticks is worth the energy. I am all for conservation, just not the negative political left using passion to scare us and come up with new ways to spend our hard earned dollars. We look at a very small picture in the last hundred years we polluted the Earth with fossil fuels, in a couple hundred more years this will not be a problem as it will be spent. Mother Earth is a tough one and I will bet any of you that she will be around longer than any of us including the politicians, fire away lefty

 

[Versus]

My tanks are like a Zen Garden to me, they're my therapy. The hobby is not as damaging to the reefs as:

Rising ocean temperatures

Ocean acidification

Desalinization

Toxic dust blowing off the Sahara Desert and settling on reefs as far away as the Caribbean

Just to name a few.

Scientists are saying they could be all gone in nature in 50 years. If humanity can find a way to remedy the situation, it could well be that the seed stock to replenish the reefs will come from coral farms, or even our tanks.

Certain corals are believed to hold chemical components that could cure diseases.

I see nothing wrong with responsible reef keeping.

Well a small point being is that when i had written what I did I was kind of saying the hobby in general. The amount of power we use etc, eventually has a fairly large impact.

Granted there are many other things which contribute more, and another side of the debate is jobs this hobby provides (lol or how many people go bankrupt trying to start something in this hobby) etc.


I really dislike it when I get a pastachio pastichio pa.. paste.. And its not cracked open, Cause thats like 5 cents wasted.

 

[Soultwater]

From my own experience the people snorkeling and diving would do a great deal of damage to the reef and this can only be changed with a law and the government enforcing that law. That being said the same would go for our hobby.