be aware! Become a friend of MAC

[Frode]

At the beginning of the new year, a bit of environmental awarness struck me.
:hmm3:

How does my hobby effect the live on natural reefs? 98% of the animals we buy come from the wild! And once they are collected, they never go back :hmm2:

What can you do. Stop your hobby...or maybe try to take the sustainable path :spin1:

After digging the internet a bit, I came across the website of the Marine Aquarium Council. I guess many of you have been there, as I was, before.

But I never took action.

Now I did, and I registerd as a friend: http://www.aquariumcouncil.org/GetInvolved.aspx?tab=BecomeAFriendOfMACID

Only 80 hobbyist did so before me...this can not be.

Lets demand sustainability in our hobby, that is the least we can do as hobbyist. Support the MAC by becomming a friend. And buy your animals at MAC certified retailers if you can!

And all the best wishes for 2011!

Don't forget: http://www.aquariumcouncil.org/GetInvolved.aspx?tab=BecomeAFriendOfMACID

 

[tkeracer619]

I think its a great idea but if memory serves me correctly they burned through 20 million and are no longer funded like they were once the donors realized their money wasn't doing much.

 

[Dustin1300]

Thanks for the link.

I'll be registering! I'd say the 98% statistic is way off as 90% of the corals I buy are frags and will not buy wild colonies of anything...In regards to fish, I'd say the number is much higher but nothing close to 98%. I completely believe in sustainability and want the reefs and hobbyist to coexist

 

[sedor]

Lets also keep in mind that our hobby is one of the least destructive forces on the natural reefs and large companies like ORA among others are taking leaps and bounds to self sustain everything. If anything we are creating awareness. And not to mention all the people in other countries that feed their families by collecting fish for us.

 

[BlueCorn]

[moved]

 

[Sk8r]

The truly positive thing our hobby does is to visually impact Joe Sixpack and his kids, who live in Oklahoma, (I did), have never seen an ocean, have never realized anything about corals, who get interested, and who now will feel very differently about what happens when the ocean environment is damaged.
Take us out of the picture, and they never see it, nobody ever sees it, they don't vote it, they don't understand or care, and nobody ever thinks about the reefs.
If not for us, the undersea for most people would be out of sight, out of mind, and not in the world they care about.

 

[Dustin1300]

Sk8r brings up a point here. If it were not for my reef I'd not have the interest in scuba diving and I'd also not have the care that I do for our oceans

 

[cortez marine]

thats it!

thats it!

Sk8r observes;

The truly positive thing our hobby does is to visually impact Joe Sixpack and his kids, who live in Oklahoma, (I did), have never seen an ocean, have never realized anything about corals, who get interested, and who now will feel very differently about what happens when the ocean environment is damaged.
Take us out of the picture, and they never see it, nobody ever sees it, they don't vote it, they don't understand or care, and nobody ever thinks about the reefs.

Wow....that explains a lot!
And gives us a window into how culture forms opinion.

In Mexico City we have a sub-culture of environmentally oriented people who identify with far right, conservative parties. [ not the left...and not liberal ]
They are the children of the richer people there and live in a place where nature is but a rumor.
In their isolation, they have seen on TV stories of great plunder and they want to do something.
Since they are less desperate economically then many poorer Mexicans, they have the leisure time to consider non income generating pursuits.
In fact, they even get to go to college.
There is produced a yearly crop of " environmentally oriented people who cannot sort rhyme from reason and fall for anything.

Anywhere there are people with disposable income who fall for anything easily, you will find the coyotes.

The environmental landscape is filled with coyotes these days.
It makes it difficult for the gullible, well intentioned to sort it out.
Pitches, websites, mission statements and brochures are about 1000 times easier to come up with then deeds......and like feeding the hungry children in Africa scams, they do great damage to the real groups that really do feed the hungry.







Thank you Sk8r!

 

[Frode]

Thank for moving the topic, I'm still not much into the structure of this forum... sorry about that.

And thanks for all your reactions. I Just hope that people with a complete other way of appriciating the reefs (see www.forthefish.org) can see that we aquarium hobbyists do care about the natural reefs. And I think it's good for us to read their opinions.

And I do think there could be more awareness amongst us aquarists about the impact of our hobby. If only because it will end if collectors don't work sustainable.
And I guess the 'deeds' mostly are up to the collectors and traders. But I think the M.A.C. has been a great step (effort) to get all actors involved in the trade - including us hobbyists - on the sustainable path.

Just hope many of us will show some support for that.

 

[Frode]

For our European friends there's another intersting organisation http://www.saia-online.eu/
English website, so all of you can watch and learn. Some interesting downloads too; fish-planning software. Guess many of us will have some comments on this; but maybe you can use it in your advantage.

 

[epic.exposures]

The truly positive thing our hobby does is to visually impact Joe Sixpack and his kids, who live in Oklahoma, (I did), have never seen an ocean, have never realized anything about corals, who get interested, and who now will feel very differently about what happens when the ocean environment is damaged.
Take us out of the picture, and they never see it, nobody ever sees it, they don't vote it, they don't understand or care, and nobody ever thinks about the reefs.
If not for us, the undersea for most people would be out of sight, out of mind, and not in the world they care about.

Love it that is so right!!!!

 

[epic.exposures]

I took up scuba diving and ocean adventures after having a saltwater tank. I'm also prompted by it to give to PADI's non profit for saving the reef. I would have never met PADI if I hadn't got scuba certified.

 

[vitz]

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/wwmadminsubwebindex/macattack.htm

I would strongly urge anyone who's thinking about supporting what was essentially one of the biggest scams perpetrated on this hobby and its industry to read the material in the links at the top of the page addressed above

Mac is about useless/meaningless paper trail creation that accomplishes nothing, other than certifying the existence of a meaningless paper trail

And food for thought: the corals killed by burning fossil fuels for electricity to run aquaria far outweigh potential (if any) corals saved by aquaria inspired 'eco awareness'