Tropical Marine Aquarium Environmental Issues
Fish Collecting and Aquarium Maintenance Affect the Environment
Jan 26, 2009
Home aquaria impact on the environment in a number of ways, through the fish trade itself, and also when all the energy costs are taken into account.
Tropical Marine Fish
- About 80% of the trade, worth over $200 million each year, involves the air-transport of wild-caught fish (from the Philippines and Indonesia) into America. There is serious concern that over-fishing and the use of inappropriate fishing techniques is harming coral reefs.
- The Marine Aquarium Council (MAC) controls a certification programme, aimed at ensuring that imported fish have been obtained in ‘environmentally-friendly’ way. An ‘Ecosystem and Fishery Management Standard’ (EFM) attempts to protect fish stocks from overexploitation, but this is difficult to oversee from afar.
- The fishermen at the collecting end of this trade are usually very poor, and conservation is often low on their list of priorities. The responsibility for the way this trade is carried out rests with the ‘consumers’ in the rich countries. If captive-bred fish are not available then EFM certified fish should be purchased – even if they are more expensive.
Tropical Marine Invertebrates
Most reef tanks contain living coral and a variety of other invertebrates. As with the fish it is important to know where and how these were collected. Captive-bred specimens are best, and failing that those obtained from dealers who adhere to principles similar to EFM (above).
Tropical Aquaria
The aquarium itself (marine or freshwater) has environmental issues surrounding it. The power consumption of a typical home aquarium (lighting, heater, filter, aerator) is comparable with that of a home refrigerator. When the ‘air-miles’ associated with fish transport are also taken into account the ecological impact (of millions of home aquaria) becomes significant.
Cold Water Tanks
- The name is a bit misleading – if you live in a warm place an unheated tank will be warm, and it will take a lot of effort to keep it cool! Generally the term ‘cold-water’ is taken to mean ‘unheated’ or ‘temperate’, and the choice of fish and invertebrates will be limited to those that can tolerate the conditions in the aquarium.
- There is a lot of information about tropical marine fish available from hobbyists and via the internet, but this is much less true for temperate fish (and invertebrate) species. This makes keeping such a tank that much more difficult, but, since it requires the hobbyist to become more involved with the natural habits of selected species, it is potentially more rewarding. Add to this the fact that temperate marine fish and invertebrates are rarely sold commercially, implying that stocking the tank usually means catching the specimens first, and you have an unusual hobby requiring close contact with the natural environment.
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