How does pulling larval fish out of the ocean to rear them in captivity help with sustainability of these fish? Maybe you could argue that destruction of habitat by pulling larger specimens off the reef is less destructive but beyond that what’s the point in terms of environmental impact?

The amount of larvae the actually make it to size is incredibly low and the amount pulled from the soup for this is also incredibly low. One just has to take a swim in the soup to see what Sustainable Aquatics is doing has a very low impact as opposed to the taking of productive adults.

I completely agree with Gresham. This is a great thing for the hobby rather than taking survivors of the “soup” or mature breeding population SA is raising something that would otherwise be lost in the abyss of the ocean. Wish our hobby saw more of this type of activity

Upon settlement from the pelagic phase, post larval fish have mortality rates well above 90%. Taking fish from the ocean before this population bottleneck means that we are leaving the survivors to breed and continue the line of strong fish reproducing and replenishing the population. Don’t forget that these same post larval fish have shockingly higher rates of survival than adults taken off the reef due to the fact that they eat prepared foods almost right off the bat and are used to human presence around aquariums, thus greatly reducing stress related mortalities. Post larval collection is the next best thing to captive breeding.

The method of collection (when and how) determines if this is a good method or bad. There has been a fatting operation going on for hippos for a while. If they are simply fattened up before export or fattened up after import that says nothing about the sustainability of the practice. If they are collecting the post-larvae pre-metamorphosis than this would a great development. Catching post-metamorphosis fish from a reef does not yield the benefits people would expect to see.

This type of fishery, if done correctly can be far better than captive cultured fish, from a ecological aspect and a socioeconomic outlook.

More info, more than a short blurb is needed to assess….

These fish are collected post metamorphosis… and this IS a huge benefit and sustainable. Gresham summed it up well. Even the survivability of post-meta fishes in the wild is very very low. Their chance of making it to market size or even reproductive size is minimal.
It’s a great development and a very beneficial practice. Even fattening up fishes is a benefit, but this is a huge step forward.
Adam
ps- not exactly new… these fish from Sustainable Aquatics have been in some retail stores for many months now

I visited a facility in Tahiti on the island of Tahiti that was doing exactly this. I don’t know what happened to that facility but it was interesting the process they went through. The had troughs of Miniatus Groupers in their backyard that were destined for the local food market. Their system was not very sophisticated but

The biggest draw back was they never knew what they were going to get but said they could tell within a couple days of collecting what fish they had.

I wish SA good luck and I hope they can expand their selection.

Some other articles:
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a909437078&db=all
http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:xN4QMQQ6xWcJ:www.spc.int/coastfish/news/LRF/17/LRF17_3_Lecaillon.pdf+university+of+moorea+post+larval+fish&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEEShMXF_31KCCzlD6dp2FWAXzhAA_Jif-K7RAn41SIe02aplZnSUmRfeGM9koMA2ZALSjxnZRUXxzF1G7Fnxd5sljKx9UnYoXKSTEgfZ91Ss9YESTNsahqnpT6x8gTq6y_pwJTqy_&sig=AHIEtbSXRBmRN4Hzt2HlehmSirQJ2OwOMg

So what is the mortality rate of the collected fish through the stages of collection, transportation and grow-out? I haven’t seen any numbers about Sustainable Aquatics’ mortality rates.

i think its a great idea, but i really doubt we will get them in south africa

our retail shop has gone through 3 shipments of these little buggers. As a retailer and former wholesaler, I steer away from 1-2 inch tangs sold as tiny or smalls. Mortality rates and sustanabiltiy of Regals is hit and miss and it is one of the fish I see starve out often. Not the case with these, eat prep foods within hours and rock solid for weeks at a time in my systems. I dont bother with the wilds from LA anymore.

It’s welcome back to more of the same…I believe that it’s the very outfit dealing with these P hepatus – were doing so IN the Solomon Islands..In fact, almost 10y ago, I consolidated more than a few imports of those AWESOME Solomon Island Percula(High Black %), and almost every size of Regal tangs… from VT(very tiny!!) upto T, S, SM

when calling directly I was informed somewhat of their methods. SO, yeah, these have been available on and off to South Africa..at a bit of a premium, due to freight routes, intermediaries(middle-men)…

Pity, though I saw something about Blue Planet Reef Farms closing due to an Indonesia facility/fish issue!

aaah well, hopeful that their efforts do not go unnoticed