Do you agree or disagree?

[AquaAlex1993]

Here is something that I've been wondering for quite a long time.
Certain monster fish have been available in the aquarium hobby for years and decades, but do they belong in the hobby? Fish like ID sharks, Pacu, gars, and red tail catfish. Fish that grow over 3' let's say. I think they don't have a place in the aquarium hobby. Once these fish get to about a 1' they are already too big for most aquariums. The ID Sharks and Pacu for example will hurt their faces as they smash and ram into the glass. At the local fish store they have 2 GIANT Id sharks about 2 and a half feet with messed up faces, I was saying to myself just put these fish out of their misery.
Why are these fish being brought into the aquarium hobby?
I am one to talk, I recently had a pacu, it was an impulse buy but he is with someone who has a 180-200 gallon aquarium, I forgot which one it was. But I bought it because it was available, but I don't plan on getting any more.
What do you guys think?
Should these fish be the fish that are illegal instead of asian arowanas and piranha?

 

[Judyok]

At the very least there should be some kind of warning about there size potential along with a visual aid like a poster of a full size red tail or pacu on the wall above the tanks. That would make a bigger impact than just saying what their potential size is.

 

[wednesday13]

This is MFK... If you ban all the fish, you have no hobby left for us, great idea...insert MFK original "ban him" imoji here....

 

[AquaAlex1993]

At the very least there should be some kind of warning about there size potential along with a visual aid like a poster of a full size red tail or pacu on the wall above the tanks. That would make a bigger impact than just saying what their potential size is.

That could help. Maybe they can work out with a deal with one of the public aquariums that have pacu and RTC and other monsters to show just how massive they get.
THE RED TAIL CAT AT NEW ENGLAND AQUARIUM IS ABOUT THE SIZE OF A 40 GALLON BREEDER.

This is MFK... If you ban all the fish, you have no hobby left for us, great idea...insert MFK original "ban him" imoji here....

Yes, this is Monster fish keepers. There are plenty of ''Monster'' fish that are perfect in the aquarium hobby. Oscars, piranha, eels, datnoids, stingrays, etc.
I am just talking about pacu, rtc, id sharks, and gars and fish that get huge.

 

[RedRaven]

Money makes the world go round. People buy fish they can't possibly house for long often knowing the potential sizes. This is not likely to change, suppliers and retailers will stock these species because they sell. The majority of people either don't realise how hard it can be to rehome large specimens, "'ll upgrade my tank in the future", "it will be fine for long time" or simply don't care. Banning these species would seriously ruin the hobby for those who can and do care for them correctly.

 

[AG458]

I mean, a warning would help sometimes! ID sharks are usually sold really small, so people see them as cute and buy them. I was one of those people at a time! Through MFK, I learned the monsters these fish become. Arapaima? 8-foot plus? People could get sold on juveniles without knowing the leviathans they become! (If I got one, I'd name it Leviathan). I was interested in arapaima once, just for the sake of being able to say I owned one, even though I'd have it for less than a year. With that in mind, selling monster fish without the poster warning is fine. LFS workers, however, should warn customers about their size and leave fish like pacu and ID sharks to the experts with the right-size tanks, and, of course, the right amount of money.

 

[Swoll929]

This comes down to personal responsibilty. The only problem with large fish like this is people are not responsible enough to look into it before they purchase. A lot of people buy an aquarium and never know what the nitrogen cycle is. You'd be disgusted if you knew how many people have children and don't have a clue what is involved with raising a child. So the short answer is no you should not limit the sale or availability. It won't do anything other than make stupid people do stupid somewhere else. at least if they buy the fish they support your local fish store. Which helps keep the doors open for the rest of us.

 

[FishBeast]

Here is something that I've been wondering for quite a long time.
Certain monster fish have been available in the aquarium hobby for years and decades, but do they belong in the hobby? Fish like ID sharks, Pacu, gars, and red tail catfish. Fish that grow over 3' let's say. I think they don't have a place in the aquarium hobby. Once these fish get to about a 1' they are already too big for most aquariums. The ID Sharks and Pacu for example will hurt their faces as they smash and ram into the glass. At the local fish store they have 2 GIANT Id sharks about 2 and a half feet with messed up faces, I was saying to myself just put these fish out of their misery.
Why are these fish being brought into the aquarium hobby?
I am one to talk, I recently had a pacu, it was an impulse buy but he is with someone who has a 180-200 gallon aquarium, I forgot which one it was. But I bought it because it was available, but I don't plan on getting any more.
What do you guys think?
Should these fish be the fish that are illegal instead of asian arowanas and piranha?

Man, you said it. So many fish that shouldn't be sold in regular stores... Like common plecos, Pacu, the pasgasid sharks, RTC, TSN etc... You're a specialist keeper with a 1000 gallon tank? Ok, email this one person who will ship you the monster fish you want. Otherwise, selections at pet stores and LFS should be limited to smaller species.

The problem is that these monsters are so cute when they are small... I myself have a Pacu that I got for my kid at Petco last year as an impulse buy. I don't know what I was thinking. It was just so darn cute. Well, at 1 year old, he is a foot long and looking to bust the 125G he is in at the moment.

 

[Yohanon]

That's what research is for. Tanks and fish to fit ones budget.

 

[Drstrangelove]

There are two legitimate reasons (I think anyway) for banning fish in a free society. One, because the fish is or is thought to be a threat to the ecosystem. Two, because the fish is or is thought to be endangered. Now in neither case has this always been true. But to some degree, it's true today.

Beyond those examples, people in free societies make bad choices. It's not up to the rest of us to stop their bad choices or to correct them so long as it doesn't directly impact us. So long as we maintain some degree of freedom, that won't change.