THE AQUARIUM TRADE
Every year, nearly 150 million exotic freshwater and marine fish, worth $200 to $330 million, are imported into the United States for use in the aquarium trade. While ninety percent of the freshwater fish are captive bred, virtually all marine aquarium fish are imported from the wild.
According to the Global Marine Aquarium Database, the top ten imported species of fish are: Amphiprion ocellaris (Clownfish), Chromis viridis (Blue Green Damselfish), Chrysiptera parasema (Yellowtail Blue Damselfish), Dascyllus aruanus (3-Strip Damsel), Monodactylus argenteus (Mono, Fingerfish), Paracanthurus hepatus (Blue Tang), Pomacanthus semicirculatus (Blue Angelfish), Scathophagus argus (Green and Ruby Scat), Tetraodon fluviatilis (Green Spotted Puffer), and Zebrasoma flavescens (Yellow Tangs).
The majority of wild caught fish are from the waters of Indonesia and the Philippines. Marine fish collection also takes place offshore Hawaii, Florida, the Caribbean Islands, Africa, Sri Lanka and other Pacific island countries.
THE COLLECTION OF EXOTIC FISH
In many areas, rural villagers are the main fish collectors. These villagers use tire inflation compressors and long hoses (called ‘hookah’ hoses) to supply air for diving. 'Hookah’ divers regularly make long and repetitive dives to 40+ meters without using dive tables or decompression stops. Serious, even fatal, dive accidents occur frequently.
Fish are collected using a variety of tools (the worst being cyanide) including fine-mesh transparent "fence" nets and smaller dip nets. With 'fence nets', collectors first scope out a reef, set up the barrier net and then drive the fish into it using their hands and a couple of long sticks. They then use small dip nets to pick out the fish they want. Fence and dip nets allow the aquarium fish collector to be selective, taking only the size and species of fish desired - as opposed to cyanide fishing which will be described shortly.
After fish are collected, they are placed in small plastic bags and then brought to export facilities in the area. The export facilities, usually large warehouses, are full of sectioned acrylic tanks which house all of the fish. Batches of fish, containing up to a thousand fish in individual plastic bags, are shipped out several times per week. These shipments go to wholesale facilities all over the world, with the largest purchasers being in the US and Europe.
The wholesale facilities are much like the exporter facilities - large warehouses with a large number of troughs and holding tanks - although there is usually a great deal more technology and the fish are segregated to a much greater extent. Some of the fish may be held at the wholesalers' for days or weeks before they are sold to retailers (pet stores).
The trip from the wholesaler to the retailer is often the most perilous part of the journey. Flight delays, temperature extremes, and rough handling dramatically increase the mortality of fish that are already stressed from having been shipped from half way around the world. The mortality during this phase of the trip is several fold higher than it is during either of the first phases.
The whole time the fish are being transported they experience more and more stress from not being in anything close to a natural environment. Increased stress reduces a fish's ability to ward off diseases and heal itself. A small amount of stress by itself is not usually fatal, but as stress levels increase, a fish's ability to cope decreases.
Once the shipments reach pet stores, the surviving fish are usually mixed together with fish from many different sources. Tanks are often overcrowded and not given the proper amount of attention. Dead fish are sometimes left on tank bottoms for days at a time. These additional stressors increase the risk of disease transmission. Very few stores have quarantine systems for their fish (or any other animals), so sick animals are often sold to unsuspecting customers who then add the infected fish to their preexisting aquariums at home - infecting those fish as well.
The likelihood of buying a sick fish, or having one die shortly after purchase, is dramatically increased if the fish was captured using cyanide.
CYANIDE FISHING
When the ornamental fish trade in the Philippines began in 1952, the fish were caught with cotton nets and traps. Collectors knew the behavior of each fish they would catch and used that to their advantage.
In 1962, a fish collector named Gonzales began to use the chemical compound sodium cyanide to stun fish, making them easy to capture. It has been suggested that Gonzales learned to use the cyanide from reading a 1958 fish toxicant study done by the Fish and Wildlife service in the US.
Since the sixties, the use of cyanide has spread through the Philippines to Indonesia and other marine collection areas. According to reports from the WWF, every year over 6000 cyanide divers squirt an estimated 150,000 kg of dissolved poison on some 33 million coral heads.
To make the cyanide solution, collectors mix crushed cyanide tablets (provided by unscrupulous exporters) with saltwater in a squeeze bottle. The solution is then squirted into coral reefs where fish are hiding. Fish are stunned and disorientated, some go into spasms, making them easily gathered. In some cases, however, the fishermen have to use crowbars to pry coral heads apart and retrieve the stunned fish.
THE EFFECTS OF CYANIDE POISONING
Fish are approximately one thousand times more sensitive to cyanide than are humans. Dose levels as low as 0.03 mg/L HCN can be ultimately fatal to sensitive species, while 0.2 mg/L is lethal to most species. Many of the fish exposed to cyanide die immediately, especially the younger and smaller fish.
Fish that survive the initial poisoning sometimes don't show signs of their exposure until days, weeks, or even months later when they die from shock or massive digestive damage.
Even the fish that live aren't without problems; studies have shown that exposure to cyanide reduces swimming ability, interferes with reproductive capacity and can lead to seriously deformed offspring. Just the stress of transport shortens their lifespan dramatically.
ECOLOGICAL IMPACT
In addition to the intended victims, cyanide fishing also kills coral polyps, symbiotic algae and other small reef organisms required for the sustenance of a healthy coral reef, eventually causing the entire ecosystem to collapse.
The coral reefs off the Philippines, once the most prolific in the world, are now rapidly declining due in large part to cyanide fishing. Collectors are now moving from the devastated reefs in the Philippines to pristine reefs in Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Palau, and other nations of the western Pacific; the damage done in the Philippines is now being done in these locations.
The high concentration of cyanide on reefs has also resulted in cases of cyanide poisoning among local fishermen and their families.
WHAT'S BEING DONE
Cyanide fishing has been illegal in the Philippines and Indonesia for many years, but that has not made any real difference. Environmentally-friendly ways of catching fish are more expensive and time consuming than cyanide fishing, and, so far, no amount of education or training has been able to change that.
THE MARINE AQUARIUM COUNCIL
To prevent the trade of illegally-caught aquarium fish, the Marine Aquarium Council, based in Honolulu, Hawaii, has created a certification in which the tropical fish are caught legally with nets only. MAC-Certified marine organisms bear the MAC-Certified label on the tanks and boxes in which they are kept and shipped.
The council's certification system enables consumers to know that the fish they buy for their home aquariums were collected, handled, and transported according to a set of internationally-approved standards. Certification also requires collection areas to have a reef management plan and no-take zones to safeguard tropical fish populations against over-harvesting.
The variety of marine fishes certified by the Marine Aquarium Council (Honolulu) continues to grow, with more than 70 species now available to retailers in North America. In addition to the highly desirable certified species previously available, MAC has added the majestic angelfish (Pomacanthus navarchus), lyretail anthias (Pseudanthias squamipinnis), psychedelic mandarinfish (Synchiropus splendidus), bicolor foxface (Siganus uspi) and exquisite fairy wrasse (Cirrhilabrus exquisitus) to its list.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
- When possible, buy only captive bred fish. Unfortunately, aquaculture comprises less than 2 percent of the marine aquarium trade and is growing very slowly due to economic and biological constraints to rearing fish in captivity. Only a few marine species, most notably seahorses and clownfish, are farm-raised.
- Ask for MAC Certified and labeled marine ornamentals. The more you ask for MAC Certified products and services, the more the industry and your fish shop will work to supply them.
- Look for retail shops with the MAC Certified label in the window and then within the shop look for the tank(s) that are also labeled "Marine Aquarium Council Certified." MAC Certified retailers may carry both MAC Certified organisms and those that are not MAC Certified. Only those tanks carrying the MAC Certified label contain MAC Certified organisms.
- Beware of stores that claim that all their fish are "net caught". Check for behavior: fish should be alert and respond to food very fast. Only MAC certified stores should be trusted.
- Expect to pay 10 to 15 percent more for net-caught fish; in this case, you get what you pay for!
- The federal Lacey Act prohibits importation into the US of any wildlife product taken in violation of the laws of the originating country. Encourage the FWS to enforce the Lacey Act:
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
1849 C Street, NW
Washington, DC 20240
RELATED SITES/SOURCES
Reducing Cyanide Use for Aquarium Fish Collection
Integrated Conservation Strategies: The Example of Cyanide Fish Collection in the Philippines
Poison and profits: cyanide fishing in the Indo-Pacific.
Aquarium fish collectors 'strip mining' Hawaii's coral reefs
UF Expert Helps Promote Standards for Saltwater Tropical Fish Industry
Non-toxic Aquarium Fish-catching
From Ocean to Aquarium: the global trade in marine ornamental species