[UniQuaria] Indian Aquar. Hobbyists was Asian biotope
g wrote:
Hi Joanna
My last post didn’t come out properly or was edited.
Glad that my countries fish are popular. But many are being caught in the wild for export and entire populations are being decimated.
Hi G. I deal mostly with fishes from India. While these fish are gaining in popularity, they are nowhere near popular as they were in the 1950’s and 1960’s (actually, earlier than the 1950’s). This is changing, though, and these fishes are being seen more and more in the American hobby. Most are wild caught. Luckily, those that are becoming popular (barbs, gouramies, Rasboras) are those that reproduce rapidly in nature. They are of low vulnerability and high resilience so, if the environment remains optimal, I don’t think there is a need to worry providing people don’t get overzealous with exports. Other fishes, such as P. denisoni, are far more vulnerable, even with their high reproductive capability. As they are found within a limited range, uncontrolled collecting has caused this fish to become threatened. Luckily, they are being bred in captivity so the export of wild stock has lessened (if it has not been halted already). Other fishes that might suffer from unregulated collecting are those found in the Western Ghats. Although most are of low vulnerability, a change in the environment coupled with over-collection could cause problems. The other thing to look at is how wildly distributed these fishes are. Those from a limited range or from a specialized environment would be more prone to problems if over-collected. Those are the fishes that should be looked at when considering captive breeding.
Our Government has no proper laws to control this.
But this is changing, from my understanding of things. These has already been one meeting in Kerala (this past February) to discuss these issues. I had hoped to get to this meeting, but was unable to get the time off from work. And there was a workshop back in 1997 (Molur, S., & Walker, S. (1998). Report of the workshop on, “ Conservation Assessment and Management Plan (CAMP) for freshwater fishes of India. Organised by Zoo Outreach Organisation and NBFGR, Lucknow, 22-26th Sep. 1997. 156 p.), although I do not know how far things went. Again, from my understanding, there are those who are working to jump start an environmentally responsible tropical fish industry based in Kerala. I hope they succeed. Also, check this out:
http://www.mpeda.com/aquarium/htmlorna/profile1.htm
I appeal to all the forum members to buy only tank bred fish.
Given that most of the Indian species are not in commercial production (hopefully this will change as this was one issue discussed at the February meeting), this will vastly limit what people will be able to buy. There is nothing wrong with getting wild stock providing the collecting of these fish is done with some forethought.
I’ll try to put up a list of endangered species soon. IAH will give you lots of info on Indian fish ans plants.
They are a great group of people there. I really need to stop by more often.
Frank
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