Cleaner wrassies

[kevin l]

The only thing in the whole entire hobby that pissed me off is cleaner wrassies. It is really messed up that we take these out of the ocean. They die starve and suffer in aquariums and do absoutley nothing but good in the ocean. That and morish idols are the fish that should be illigal to collect. It's just screwed up. Unless the fish are farm raised whitch I don't thaink the case is for these particular fish. How does everyone else feel about these two fish

[BigAl07]

This is s VERY passionate topic and most people agree with your points here. I do know of a couple of people who have indeed had "long-term" success with each of the fish you've mentioned. Unfortunately these people are the exception and not the rule.

Another point to make is that "Cleaner Wrasse" once removed from the ocean leave a "Gap" in the eco-system that few other fish can fill. They provide a very needed and often times life-saving service on the reef.

As long as these animals are available for sale they will be kept in home aquaria.

On a side note . . . there is a "Mimic" cleaner wrasse that looks and acts almost identical to the real fish. It waits until a "client" opens it's gills for cleaning and will literally start eating the fishs gills immediately. We've seen THOSE sold in the trade AS cleaner wrasse lately.

[kevin l]

Yes I have hurd if these. And I am on of the people with a supernatrial cleaner wrassie. Eats absoutly nothing off of my fish and has been alive ( and fat) for about six months. But it's still screwed up. Do u know what percent of the fish and corals now days are tank raised. I hear we are taking fewer and fewer stuff out of the ocean and doing it by farm raising.

[BigAl07]

I don't have a clue what percentage of fish is "Captive Raised" because there are not THAT many that we know enough about to Captive Breed/Raise.

Coral on the other hand.... we are able to Propagate a HUGE amount of them. I'm striving to buy "captive Breed" on anything that it's possible. I don't mind paying a little more to ensure it's not wild caught if there is an option.

[kevin l]

Cool that's good to here. I never cared about this whole protection thing until I actualy saw a reel reef for myself and I relized that my aquarium looked better. It was weird and sad at the same time.