<HTML><FONT FACE=arial,helvetica><FONT SIZE=2>In a message dated 12/5/2000 2:41:57 AM Pacific Standard Time, <BR>gjgast@freeler.nl writes:
<BR>
<BR>
<BR><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">But things are worse. Not only survival in the aquaria matters. This man
<BR>
<BR>personally goes to Indonesia to buy his corals, pack them and fly them here,
<BR>
<BR>which takes about 30 hours. He admitted that the the SURVIVAL rate of his
<BR>
<BR>shipments is 10-50% only!!!!!!!! And this man does care, because he makes a
<BR>
<BR>living out of it (and loves corals). </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR>
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><This is a ludicrous statement... The economics of collection, shipping, <BR>handling, reselling would not support such incidental mortality... ><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">
<BR>
<BR>I do not know whether this one shop owner I saw, is representative for the
<BR>
<BR>business and I realise that some people (e.g. Julian) are able to keep <BR>healthy,
<BR>
<BR>thriving corals for years and years, but I do get the impression that <BR>things in
<BR>
<BR>general are far from ideal. One way ticket indeed.... and a short holiday!
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR><This is the sort of proclamation that used to be applied to bird and mammal <BR>species that are being preserved via captive breeding programs...>
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">
<BR><color><param>0000,7F00,0000</param>>but if the people who can propagate <BR>corals and fish were
<BR>
<BR>> numerous enough, most of the aquarium shops would no longer have a market <BR>for
<BR>
<BR>> fish and corals (or they'd be reselling what their customers grew). </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR><I dispute this statement as well... The most successful "shops" in the <BR>ornamental aquatics businesses make a substantial, arguably their largest <BR>profits from the resale of captive-propagated livestock... algae, stony and <BR>soft corals, corallimorphs... even some giant actinarians. The trend is to <BR>selling/growing captive mainly asexually cultured material... as the <BR>tridacnid part of the industry went>
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">
<BR> Fact is,<BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px"> their business continues undiminished. Of course, if the shops <BR>sold all tank
<BR>
<BR>> raised or maricultured organisms, there would be no effect on reefs.</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR><Disagreeable... humans will still increase their populations, average energy <BR>consumption... However, weigh the difference (the null hypothesis) of <BR>exposure or not to the living world... How sympathetic will/would the public <BR>be to "saving" a given habitat with no/little personal relevant experience? <BR>Maybe they'd abandon funding "coral/reef research"... disband NOAA, ...? >
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">
<BR>> Yes, the removal from the wild of common species from widely dispersed
<BR>
<BR>> locations will have no effect on wild populations, and would provide <BR>sorely
<BR>
<BR>> needed income in developing countries. But a large part of the trade is <BR>not
<BR>
<BR>> in the common or rapidly growing species. Home aquariasts who grow corals
<BR>
<BR>> prefer branching species that grow rapidly and fragment easily (like
<BR>
<BR>> Acropora). But the importers prefer fleshy corals because their clientele
<BR>
<BR>> buys them.</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR><Invalid. Importers (i.e. wholesalers, transhippers, jobbers import a mix of <BR>what is offered and what is in demand... fleshy types (LPS) corals are not as <BR>popular as they once were...>
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">
<BR> And some of those fleshy corals are quite rare. For example, last</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">
<BR>> year we had a request from an Indonesian official for information- they <BR>were
<BR>
<BR>> considering a limit of 25,000 Catalaphyllia jardini per year, and a much
<BR>
<BR>> higher limit for Nemenzophyllia. Catalaphyllia is rare enough that I did <BR>not
<BR>
<BR>> see one in my last 75 dives in Indonesia (and I was looking). <BR>Nemenzophyllia
<BR>
<BR>> is even rarer- so rare that the world expert, Veron, has never seen one <BR>in the
<BR>
<BR>> wild!
<BR><Hard to find Catalaphyllia's in the wild (this caryophyllid is mainly <BR>found/collected in shallow "grass" beds... but/and it is/has been better <BR>popularized/vilified as a poorly suited aquarium species... and therefore <BR>largely abandoned commercially>
<BR>
<BR></color>Odd. According to the CITES data base 8537 pieces of Nemenzophyllia <BR>were exported from Indonesia in 1997 (quotum 18000). Does this indicate:
<BR>
<BR>a. misidentification or confusion with similar species?</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR><Maybe, but this "Fox Coral" is popular... >
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">
<BR>b. intentional wrong naming to keep numbers of similar species within <BR>quota?
<BR>c. that they are gone now?
<BR>d. that Charlie Veron should hire an Indonesion coral collector as a guide?
<BR>Bonus: the guy is kept out of mischief.... :-)
<BR><Where would the money come from?>
<BR>
<BR><color><param>0000,7F00,0000</param>> Is this
<BR>
<BR>> sustainable harvest, or irresponsible ripping out of a rare species?
<BR>
<BR>> Unfortunately, we don't know, and nobody is about to put up the money to
<BR>
<BR>> finance the research needed to find out. But on the face of it, it <BR>doesn't
<BR>
<BR>> look good. (I understand that these corals can be fragmented and grown in
<BR>
<BR>> aquaria with care, which would be a better way)
<BR>
<BR>> I have to respond to the view that if villagers collect coral to sell,
<BR>> they will value their reef and protect it. If only that were true. Coral
<BR>> collecting for the curio trade went on for years in Florida and the
<BR>> Philippines without any indication of trying to conserve the resource. <BR>Cyanide
<BR>> fishing for the aquarium trade continues widespread in the Philippines, <BR>and is
<BR>> very hard to eradicate. The live food fish trade is said to be a billion
<BR>> dollar industry in southeast Asia, and threatens to extinguish bumphead <BR>wrasse
<BR>> and large groupers. Blast fishing is very common and hard to control in <BR>the
<BR>> Philippines, Indonesia, and elsewhere. Jamaicans have fished every last <BR>adult
<BR>> fish out of their waters, and are now down to eating new recruits in "fish
<BR>> tea".
<BR>
<BR></color>Sadly, all too true. The solution will probably be that importing <BR>countries will stop all import of wild corals as cultured corals come more <BR>and more
<BR>available. The culture business needs this help. It is impossible to grow
<BR>corals commercially for the low prices one pays for wild corals (mostly in <BR>the
<BR>order of US$ 2 - 8 for a piece). </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR><The landed (i.e. net) price of wild corals versus cultured is not so <BR>disparate... further there are known and popular reasons for buying "home <BR>made" including higher survivability, adaptability to captive conditions, <BR>diminished chance of importing pathogens and pests... The cultured product <BR>demands and receives more money>
<BR>
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">The CITES authorities need to squeeze off the <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">trade of wild corals to give <BR>the sustainable culture a chance. </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR>
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><Anyone is open to review the fisheries history of such "controls"... e.g. <BR>the Yellowfin Tuna/Marine Mammal debacle (MMPA) should be sobering... Do you <BR>really believe governments ultimately protect, preserve such resources? Or <BR>does such a stance merely self-serve to further funding...? ></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">
<BR>[snip] (CO2)
<BR>
<BR>Back to line one:
<BR>
<BR><color><param>0000,7F00,0000</param>> A while back, someone suggested <BR>that since reefs were dying, perhaps one could save things by setting up an <BR>aquarium and stocking it with
<BR>
<BR></color>species to
<BR>
<BR><color><param>0000,7F00,0000</param>> try to save as many as possible.
<BR>
<BR></color>Let's imagine this. Coral Dougia charlieii has gone extinct in the <BR>wild. It
<BR>appears that quite a few people have colonies of this species at home.
<BR>However, they are all clones of a few originals taken from the wild 10 <BR>years
<BR>before. We spend an enormous amount of time, money and effort to clone
<BR>100,000 colonies and place them on a reef. Questions:
<BR>
<BR>- Is the cause of the extinction gone? (Does anyone know an example where
<BR>an environment has been restored before the reintroduction of a species???) <BR>-
<BR>Can these corals still survive in the wild after a decade in aquaria?
<BR>
<BR>- Will they sexually reproduce in the wild?
<BR>
<BR>- Even if they do, can the larvae survive?
<BR>
<BR>- Is the rate of crossing over in corals sufficient to generate new genetic
<BR>diversity?
<BR>
<BR>- Are any bacterial or viral diseases brought into the water that these <BR>corals
<BR>are immune for, but which may rampage through populations of other
<BR>species?
<BR>
<BR>This whole idea just won't work in my opinion. Worse, talking about saving
<BR>corals in aquaria sounds like an easy escape route and destracts from the
<BR>real issue: <bold>saving corals on reefs</bold>. Not in the future, but <BR>NOW. Reduction of human influences is paramount. The first thing corals <BR>need is an environment
<BR>in which they can survive. Maybe we have to help some species to stay on
<BR>or return to a critical number, but the only sound way would to multiply <BR>them
<BR>sexually to ascertian genetic diversity. Or even better: by using colonies
<BR>resistant to bleaching as parents..... breeding corals for the future......
<BR>opinions, objections, feelings???????
<BR><Agreed... for the most part, restoring wild stocks of marines from <BR>captive-propagated materials is unrealistic (though transplanting <BR>definitely "does work"). Corridors as proposed for terrestrial biotopes are <BR>what need to be established and protection-enforced in the wild... The <BR>usual "political" questions remain: Who is to decide, whose resources, who <BR>will pay/compensate the displaced/disenfranchised parties... What are the <BR>opportunity costs to be borne, what better ways can the resource be <BR>utilized.... </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>Robert Fenner>
<BR>
<BR>Dr. Gert Jan Gast
<BR>Oostelijke Handelskade 31
<BR>1019BL Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
<BR>Phone int 31 (0)20 4198607
<BR>Email: gj@coralvision.org
<BR>Else: gjgast@dds.nl (max 1 MB) or gjgast@freeler.nl
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