Reefkeeping, Oh the Irony

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ReefBuddha... This post has made me want to go home and take some anti-depressants!!! To call us all superficial hypocrites and show us a bucket of dead clownfish as a way of trying to make everyone fell as quilty as you is pretty crappy. It appears that most overyone agrees with you to a certain extent... so far, as do I. I believe that we should buy O.R.A and captive bred, but lets not make everybody start crying. I didn't join this forum so that you could come along and pee in my cereal.
 
Kannin,
Although I sympathize with your expression of how awful it all sounds and makes you feel, your response appears to be an example of the casual denial we should all work against, and exactly why acknowledging reality is important. If facing the realities of your chosen behavior makes you uncomfortable, perhaps a change in behavior is something to consider. If a pragmatic perspective of our hobby gives you a sense of depression and injustice, then maybe it's a cause worth fighting for. But don't blame the messenger just because he exposes a harsh reality you'd rather pretend does not exist.

I realize I don't utilize sugar coating, but honestly I don't think it's an issue to be sweetened. From a psychologically analytical perspective though, it's certainly interesting to see the different ways in which people react to uncomfortable realities about their chosen activities.

Again, the ability to cite other point-source and non-point sources of ocean exploitation such as by-catch or agricultural runoff does not in any way negate the points I'm making, although it may act as a feel-better technique and help people sleep better.

to the person who claimed that public aquariums are more destructive and less justified than the marine ornamental trade in terms of education, i have to respectfully disagree and would ask you to think about that stance a bit more.

Thanks everyone for the input/feedback. I think it's important to periodically address these unfortunate realities less we get too caught up in the more superficial topics of the hobby, as is so often the case.

Hope everyone has a good holiday weekend.

:)
 
I might just flush the whole thing and get a lizard. Oh... wait! Maybe they're being persicuted too. Am I responsible for a bucket of dead schnauzers somewhere???

Oh and by the way... How many whale sharks did the Georgia Aquarium kill this year??? Are they a less destructive source of awareness??? You make me want to go out and buy another clown!
 
i guess you don't eat fish? As far as corals go, mine are all aquacultured and most of my rock was not "live".

I don't feel guilty at all...
 
Reefbuddha, I know that getting on your high-horse seems like a great way to change peoples attitude, but if anything it is just going to polarize things. Reefing isn't going to stop anymore than people are going to stop eating seafood. The fact is that what is needed is people like you to direct your energy towards organizing things so we have access to livestock that is collected ethically or better yet captive bred. In other words, a constructive attitude is needed instead of a cynical counter-culturist one. Talking down to people and treating them as if they are children in a self-deluded wonderland is just going to cause them to ignore you. What is even more screwy about it is that with some positive direction the reefcentral community could actually do its share to help change things. At the least, we could be directing peoples attitudes toward collecting species that are ethically collected.
 
Reef Buddha. I do appreciate your psycho analysis... but, what I was really trying to say, was... Please keep it in the forum you originally posted this rant, instead of smacking us in the face with it. Many of us in this forum just want learn how to kill aiptasia and see pictures of other reef tanks.

Here's mine:
100_0926.jpg


100_0692.jpg


Here's my clown who, by the way, narrowly escaped the bucket.
100_0857.jpg


Let's see your's... Turn that frown upsidedown!
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10678169#post10678169 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by aninjaatemyshoe
Reefbuddha, I know that getting on your high-horse seems like a great way to change peoples attitude, but if anything it is just going to polarize things. Reefing isn't going to stop anymore than people are going to stop eating seafood. The fact is that what is needed is people like you to direct your energy towards organizing things so we have access to livestock that is collected ethically or better yet captive bred. In other words, a constructive attitude is needed instead of a cynical counter-culturist one. Talking down to people and treating them as if they are children in a self-deluded wonderland is just going to cause them to ignore you. What is even more screwy about it is that with some positive direction the reefcentral community could actually do its share to help change things. At the least, we could be directing peoples attitudes toward collecting species that are ethically collected.

Thank you for this reply...

With all due respect, I'm not sure what you think you're going to accomplish with your thread, except to make yourself feel better that you made an environmental statement. There seem to be a number of these "we're killing our oceans" threads lately. I think we're all aware of the impact that our hobby, and seafood fishing, and all endeavors that involve the ocean, are contributing to the demise of millions of creatures - both in the oceans and on land. We are not deluded hobbiests. You're not the first to tell us all this. I think we, as a group, are probably more conscious and more actively trying to protect our ocean life than the average person. After this post, I am going to stop posting replies to posts such as this. I don't think they are generating any new discussion.

I do my best to do what I can...I compulsively recycle, buy recylced products, purchase seafood that I believe has been responsively raised/harvested (see Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program, I try to purchase tank-bred livestock whenever possible. Try posting some suggestions that people can follow to help. Simply posting what you yourself describe as a rant is not saving the oceans. But I do appreciate that you are concerned about the environment. I wish more people were more concerned.
 
I think captive propagation of clownfish is booming. I'd venture to say you'd be more likely to find a tank raised clown at any given LFS than a wild caught one nowadays. A lot of people are doing it and it's just cheaper. They've also just recently been able to breed some types of Angelfish on a limited basis which is sweet.

They're a long way from being able to breed tangs in captivity though. They may never be able to. I think their best bet would be to create a large sanctuary in the open ocean somewhere and limit the number taken. They spawn in huge schools and let all the eggs get carried out to open sea with the currents. Many get eaten during the event. Nobody's even sure what triggers their spawning. There is the typical speculation of moon phases and water temps though.

As far as coral and anemones, I think it's getting FAR easier now to find just about anything you want, tank raised, than anything coming from the ocean. Both my BTAs are splits from people's tanks. Many of my corals were frags from local people. It's just easier and cheaper. Captive raised xenia, zoos, mushrooms, SPS....just about everything but the rarest of the rare abounds in this hobby.

If indeed there is such a thing as global warming happening right now, and we're going to lose the reefs in 30 years, I'd much rather have them collect all the aussie acans, zoos, SPS, LPS people can get their hands on. If global warming does exist, be it man made, nature or a combination of both, there's NO WAY we can stop it. We may as well take what we can get now, spread the corals out in captivity and hopefully future generations will be able to enjoy what would then be extinct in the wild. Live coral may someday be a very valuable asset. Who knows? If it all gets lost in the wild, it's gone. If 10 people have tanks set up and 8 crash, those 8 can still all be replenished by the 2 tanks remaining.

Of course the actual numbers are likely in the hundreds of thousands so I'd say the future of reefkeeping is probably pretty safe by captive propagation methods alone.

If the wild resources run out, the only ones I see that mainly will lose out would be the fly-by- night reefers that give it a try for a few months and then throw everything away because it all died, because they never had a passion for the hobby. Which I'm not too overly concerned with.

There's always somebody out there selling off their entire reef and all livestock. I suspect it would take a LOOONG time before those options ever ran out. I suspect Tangs and most Angelfish would be a thing of the past though.

I'd also have to agree that I'm MUCH more concerned with commercial fishing practices than collection for the hobby. The worlds population just keeps exploding. More and more mouths to feed. Many coastal communities in Africa rely on the ocean for their only source of protein. There are huge ships dragging nets a half mile wide, out in the open ocean that catch anything and everything they can get every day. It all gets loaded on a conveyor belt, sorted through and then ground up. Most of what gets thrown back is dead.

If there's money in it and it's food for people, it will be exploited.

At the pace we're going, the world will not be able to sustain us anyway in another few hundred years I suspect. Somebody's going to lose out eventually.
 
In reality, we probably do more harm by the elctricity it takes to run our tanks than the colection of the specimens do. Not saying we shouldn't try to buy tank raised fish and corals.

A simple question Reeferbuda, what's your real username? Or was it to shameful to bring up a topic like this without using another name? Or are you on reefcentral to just stir up trouble?
 
Yeah, barracudas are evil, they kill little nemos, they should all be destroyed. I hope none of you PETA guys wear gold jewelry; did you know that in 2000 a cyanide spill in Romania left 2000 TONNES of fish dead in Hungary alone? If you wear gold, you support the slaughter of fish. Wal-mart sells gold, if you shop there, you hate nature and global warming is your fault. So is the war in Iraq.
 
Guys, I dont think you are getting it. The OP is not saying that this is the largest threat to our oceans. He is pointing out to hypocrisy of our hobby. If you truly loved and respected these animals, wouldn't you rather them be "happy" in their natural environment?

And, no, I dont eat seafood :)
 
Great googly moogly, I've never seen so much pathetic navel gazing in one thread in my life. Reefbuddha, if you want to get rid of your tank then just do it, but posting this drivel to soothe your guilty conscious is lame.
 
Rommel was awesome, too bad him and Patton didn't have the chance to fight it out. I'm surprised somebody else recognized him.:thumbsup:
 
first off, reefbuddha, how about next time you get this wild hair up your you know what, you start by cancelling your membership to reefcentral..................do i feel bad that i have killed, well lets see........................about 4 clowns, a couple triggers, like four of them dory things, like 8 seahorses, and god knows how many inverts, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, not really, am i in denial about it, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, not really, hey i had ham for dinner, and a burger at the broncos game last night, am i in denial about how i feel about eating the meat, again, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, although the heartburn kinda sucked, i see what your saying, but pick a better audience, if the raging hippies in the responsible reef keeping forum did not respond how you wanted to should have been a sign to leave it alone. go make a pretty sign and stand infront of your LFS, you might have more luck there.

I move for two things, first off, this forum is not intended for this, i hope the rc staff will step up and remove this thread, and the rest like it that arent in the right forum..........................

second, hey kannin, i see you only have one clown, lets get a group order on some clowns going, i need another, so lets start a group buy for clowns lost of clowns, maybe three or four buckets full of them.........................................reefbuddha, dont you worry, i will not loose any sleep tonight over the many souls of nemos brothers and sisters that are lost, my only grief is that the stars of finding nemo 2 through like 20 could have been in those buckets, and thats a true lose to society as we know it, now americas kids will never know the orange fish we all love....................................hey i have a third now, man when you get going you just keep going, lets go to the cattle ranches and ask the rancher if he feels bad when he puts his livelyhood on that truck to be slaughtered. hey reefbuddha, i know this town in colorado, its called boulder, they have a few more slots for extremist like you, you should join them i am sure they will sit down and cry with you over those pictures, hey i scrolled past them like five times, and on the fifth time, i finally thought to myself, what a looser this buddha guy must be, life sucks man, things die, but you know what thats life man. dont get me wrong, if the worlds reefs are lost, that will be a great loss to every human, i want my kids kids to have the same love for the coral reefs, but dude, my tank in my living room is what has given me a true love for them.................................................so back to my first comments, next time go to the top and just cancel your membership, and hey just know that i will be in the forums trying to make my tank look like the tank of the months this wekk, and hey kannin, i must say..................NICE TANK.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10679582#post10679582 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by owenb01
Rommel was awesome, too bad him and Patton didn't have the chance to fight it out. I'm surprised somebody else recognized him.:thumbsup:
I did as well. But I wasn't going to ask.
 
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