Your thoughts on recent mini tiger boom

Gage Zamrzla

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Nice 3 bar shaiful, I got two just like it. It's probably just coincidence and let me know if it's the same for you but my two 3 bar IT are always fully stable and my 4 bar is only sometimes stable. Not getting into the stability thing because it's been beaten to death on multiple forums I just thought it was interesting and hopefully it stays that way.
 

Gage Zamrzla

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I haven't seen any here in socal? So I wouldn't really call it a boom. What puzzles me is that I know they're not captive bred because it would be posted up everywhere online. But how the hell do you catch a .25" fish in a river?
I guess I could have rephrased the title a little, what's happening is they're booming in Singapore and the shop I work at has had them available for a few weeks now and we're able to bring in a pretty good number of them. The first two groups were brought in because my coworker assumed I'd want them and go figure she was right. I'm just somewhat concerned that the fact that they're being captured so small could mean no more tigers if this keeps up.
 

Lambrakopoulos

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Where is everyone getting these little guys. Any vendor in particular?
 

Gage Zamrzla

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All Indo, NTT, and Pulcher are wild caught.
NTT will be the next fish to become really scares out of NTT and Indo. Mainly because of where they're all caught, which is The Mekong in the north east of Thailand.
The river in that area is drying up quicker than usual in summer because of the Dams up river in China. In addition to this I only every see 2 or 3 inch fish for sale, so where are the big ones? Eaten would be my guess, the same as the ST in Thailand.
I'm also no expert on Dats. I own 3 NTTs. Never owned and indo or a pulcher. I got interested in the subject because I asked the question about captive bred indos on here. I saw thousands of tiny indos for sale in Bangkok. The were being sold in plastic bags on the side walk near Chatuckak market. Vendors were telling me captive bred, but I could find no evidence of it at all. I visited big fish farms here and saw nothing. I also visited a university to talk to the staff in the Faculty of Fisheries about the ST breeding programme in Thailand and to get their thoughts on Indo breeding, and I spoke to a member of staff at the Department of Fisheries on the same subject. I'm 100% certain Dats are not farm Bred, especially pulchers.
As for the small ones that keep being shown. I reckon some of them are real, but the vast majority are not pulcher. I've been told by 2 separate catchers and sellers of NTT to steer well clear of them, and any that are found in Bangkok's Chatuchak market are not the real thing. These guys were catching ST in Thailand years ago, they know what they're talking about and have the contacts in JJ market to get you what ever you want.
About 5 months after seeing all the baby indos in plastic bags I was offered "st" in Chatuchak market. I challenged the seller and said that it wasn't ST, but indo. He asked me how can i tell the difference, it looks the same. It was only 400BHT, compared to the normal 200BHT for regular indo.
For me there are too many clues pointing in the same direction. I might be wrong but that's my own feelings.
Thorough as usual, thanks for the input. Let me ask, do you think that this could be a problem, fishing them so young and all?
 

Gage Zamrzla

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Where is everyone getting these little guys. Any vendor in particular?
My shop is getting them from our usual supplier, same as the rest of our fish. It's just a guess but I think they're going to be more readily available in the coming weeks in more locations.
 

classic-chassis

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Of course it's a problem. I'm not sure about Indonesia, but in Thailand catching and selling the young, while eating the grown is obviously unsustainable.
If Pulcher were eaten in Thailand, you can bet your house they eat them in Cambodia, and more than likely in Vietnam too. Did you know that pulcher in it's last years in Thailand would fetch more on a dinner plate in the posh Chinese restaurants in China Town than it would being sold into a fish tank! If all these little fishes we see are really Pulcher, and the catch them with nets, how do the big ones survive? It's impossible to fish with nets for small fish and not kill big fish by accident.
 
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