Keeping difficult fish vs. fishing

michealprater

michealprater

Angelfish Nerd
Premium Member
I see a lot of people take greif on the forums because they attempt difficult species. In most case the fish dies, but in some cases it lives. Who kills more fish, aquarist or fisherman? I would have to believe it is fisherman that catch and keep for food. I rarely see any fisherman bashing on the forum. Isnt that strange? I guess if people would eat thier dead aquarium fish it would be more acceptable.... LOL.
 
The funny part is most of the difficult species, are just difficult, not endangered. Most of them are just as plentiful as the fish that consider ok to "sport fish" for. I have no problem with fishing or fisherman in general, I do however have a problem with people who harrass others for attempting difficult fish. That is of course, if the system they are running is proper size, established and is free of predators. I dont agree with sending a fish to certain death.
 
Even funnier, I was watching a thread that had some dive photos. Very beautiful stuff. I mentioned collecting for yourself with a fishing license, and got flamed. Then in the same thread a guy posted a photo of all his "spear fishing" catches of the day, and no one mentioned a word. It is considered taboo to catch something and keep it alive, but it is completely ok to kill a species as long as you eat it? I dont get it? LOL


People lets here your thoughts!
 
michealprater said:
Even funnier, I was watching a thread that had some dive photos. Very beautiful stuff. I mentioned collecting for yourself with a fishing license, and got flamed. Then in the same thread a guy posted a photo of all his "spear fishing" catches of the day, and no one mentioned a word. It is considered taboo to catch something and keep it alive, but it is completely ok to kill a species as long as you eat it? I dont get it? LOL


People lets here your thoughts!
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I think thats funny too. I actually mentioned on a thread a while back how my brother and I collected some fish locally and kept them in a local species tank and the responses were split between "wow, thats cool" and "you really shouldnt do this, you can adversely affect the local populations". Really? My one local temperate fish will adversely affect the ecosystem more than the 3,000 yellow tangs that were taken in one shot so you could have 1? Its one of the hypocracy's pf the hobby that people tend to overlook or skew in their favor so they feel like they are preserving the environment by keeping a box of fish in their home. I love my reef, and I love keeping the fish and corals, but I dont kid myself when it comes to my impact on the natural ecosystem and the industry that I choose to support.
 
username in use said:
I think thats funny too. I actually mentioned on a thread a while back how my brother and I collected some fish locally and kept them in a local species tank and the responses were split between "wow, thats cool" and "you really shouldnt do this, you can adversely affect the local populations". Really? My one local temperate fish will adversely affect the ecosystem more than the 3,000 yellow tangs that were taken in one shot so you could have 1? Its one of the hypocracy's pf the hobby that people tend to overlook or skew in their favor so they feel like they are preserving the environment by keeping a box of fish in their home. I love my reef, and I love keeping the fish and corals, but I dont kid myself when it comes to my impact on the natural ecosystem and the industry that I choose to support.
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So very true. To play all high and mighty when they are keeping an aquarium is just silly. If they truly believe what they were saying, they would not have an aquarium or even frequent this site. You are dead on, hypocracy. It is what it is, and everyone should realize that. Aquarist put a minimal toll on our enviroment compared to what else is going on in the world. People should think before they flame someone on here. There is fruit far more low hanging on the tree that they could be picking if they just lived what they were preaching.
 
michealprater said:
I see a lot of people take grief on the forums because they attempt difficult species. In most case the fish dies, but in some cases it lives. Who kills more fish, aquarist or fisherman? I would have to believe it is fisherman that catch and keep for food. I rarely see any fisherman bashing on the forum. Isn't that strange? I guess if people would eat their dead aquarium fish it would be more acceptable.... LOL.
Click to expand...

Hmmm, apples and oranges here, IMO. Most people that give the "grief" do so because the fish has a horrible to non-existent track record in captivity. And without some novel, new, different, ground breaking methodology, they are simply trying the same thing that many aquarists in the past 20 years have tried. So if the goal is to keep the fish alive, then they have a 99.99% chance of failure. If the goal of the fisherman is to catch and eat the fish, I think the odds of achieving that goal, are better. :)

Look, I have no comment on spear fishing, non-release fishing, or any other sport that involves killing animals for sport. This is not a site about that. This is a reef/marine fish aquarium site, so I think that is what people comment about most.
 
SDguy said:
Hmmm, apples and oranges here, IMO. Most people that give the "grief" do so because the fish has a horrible to non-existent track record in captivity. And without some novel, new, different, ground breaking methodology, they are simply trying the same thing that many aquarists in the past 20 years have tried. So if the goal is to keep the fish alive, then they have a 99.99% chance of failure. If the goal of the fisherman is to catch and eat the fish, I think the odds of achieving that goal, are better. :)

Look, I have no comment on spear fishing, non-release fishing, or any other sport that involves killing animals for sport. This is not a site about that. This is a reef/marine fish aquarium site, so I think that is what people comment about most.
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Valid points indeed. But I am not sure there are too many fish that are attempted with a 99.99% failure rate. There are several fish that probably have a 50% failure rate that are kept regularly. However, if everyone just kept damsels, it would be a boring hobby. Thanks for your input, every good debate has to have valid points on both sides, and you provided them.
 
michealprater said:
Valid points indeed. But I am not sure there are too many fish that are attempted with a 99.99% failure rate. There are several fish that probably have a 50% failure rate that are kept regularly. However, if everyone just kept damsels, it would be a boring hobby. Thanks for your input, every good debate has to have valid points on both sides, and you provided them.
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Oh there are plenty with the 99.99% failure rate. I personally restrict my grief giving to those that try pinnate bats, ornate butterflies, and the like ;)

Fish that are just difficult, well, that's up to the aquarist to understand the demands of the fish, and provide the proper environment.
 
SDguy said:
Oh there are plenty with the 99.99% failure rate. I personally restrict my grief giving to those that try pinnate bats, ornate butterflies, and the like ;)

Fish that are just difficult, well, that's up to the aquarist to understand the demands of the fish, and provide the proper environment.
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I can understand your point on the fish listed. Might as well catch them for food... LOL. I should have clarified, I meant fish like cleaner wrasses, regal angels and achilles tangs. While these fish are difficult, they are possible to keep by experienced aquarists.
 
But what make an aquarists experienced?Does keeping clown fish for 10 years makes you experience enough to keep a regal angel?What makes you experience enough to keep one of those fish?If you have never had flukes in 10 years how do you know what to do when you get it?If all your fish ate within the 1st 2 weeks how do you know what it takes to get a fish to eat?
 
All the measurements you mentioned are indeed subjective. Even if I would answer each question, it would just be an opinion and not facts. Thanks for participating in the thread.
 
Micheal, i agree with you. i can see the points for the other side though.

one question... if u had a fish for like 2 years and then it died, would you consider that success or failure? to me, i consider it to be success and i would move on to the next fish cuz that's just the way it is. but i'm sure there are others who would consider that failure.
 
timdam said:
Micheal, i agree with you. i can see the points for the other side though.

one question... if u had a fish for like 2 years and then it died, would you consider that success or failure? to me, i consider it to be success and i would move on to the next fish cuz that's just the way it is. but i'm sure there are others who would consider that failure.
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I would consider the circumstances that led to the death. If it died in a power outage or someone knocked beer in the tank, I'd say you kept it successfully for two years. If it was a failure to thrive and it just "randomly" died one day, I'd count it as a failure.
 
Would it be ok if you ate the fish if it died ? Basically you'd be keeping an expensive seafood tank.
 
IMO, most of the criticism comes from people who have tried to keep the difficult fish in question, didn't have success, and therefore takes the approach "if I can't keep this fish alive than you can't either." Most of this comes from jealously and I suppose a small part comes from people that genuinely want to provide sincere advice. However, this doesn't answer the question why this person got this fish in the first place since it was considered difficult when they bought the fish as well. It's not like the difficult fish list has changed much over time. If anything, fewer fish are now considered difficult with the advances in food.
 
I like to see the difficult fish at least get a shot at living. More like personal preference, or I'm just jealous I didn't beat them to the cool fish.

It's like watching someone who really sucks at basketball trying to shoot 3 pointers and dunk. eventually you're just like go do a lay-up man.
 
Most of the fish were doomed before hobbyist buy them anyway. As soon as they are yanked out of the ocean, we are their only hope. Sure people will say, that by buying these fish we encourage the divers to continue to capture fish. Good point, but unless all of us decide to quit keeping fish, which wont happen, it is a moot point. It is hypocritical for someone to say we are responsible for the fish being captured, when they own a fish aquarium.

small alien, it doesnt matter to me where they put this discussion, feel free to report it and ask a mod to move it. If it makes no sense to you, you may want to stick to threads that make more sense to you. :D
 
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