Wild Caught vs Farm Raised

[dogofwar]

Most hobbyists consider bigger and bulkier with "better" ... which is why they power feed their fish ... and you can create monsters that get way bigger in tanks than nature.

I keep circulation pumps in many of my larger tanks to reduce aggression: more energy spent on fighting the current, the less on beating each other!

One thing I have noticed in pond raised/aquarium raised cichlids (and even some live bearers), especially rheophillic species, is a change or loss in body aerodynamics.
In ponds with minimal flow, or tanks with simple aeration/filtration, HOB, canister flows, these species tend to slightly loose the torpedo/aerodynamic shape compared to wild varieties where a constant riverine wall of water is normal.
Whether this is important to the average aquarist may be moot, but.....
It is why I try to maintain a strong linear flow down the length of tanks with riverine species.
On my current Andinoacara tank, by using a 1500 GPH pump, this helps, although compared to the current/flow these fish were caught in, it is at certain seasonal times a tad wimpy.
In the article below, where soon after a dam was erected, and flow changed, skeletal changes in fish were rapid, and noticeable
PDFRapid morphological change in multiple cichlid ecotypes.pdf

And compare the streamlined body shape of the wild Poecilia in this Cenote (the flow is minimal, yet laminar upwelling is noticeable while snorkeling) to the more plump bodied aquarium strains normally seen in LFSs.
Of course exercise due to space, over feeding, and selective breeding for odd shapes, may also account for certain unnatural roundness in some aquarium fish.
Aktun Ha

 

[duanes]

Most hobbyists consider bigger and bulkier with "better" ... which is why they power feed their fish ... and you can create monsters that get way bigger in tanks than nature.

I keep circulation pumps in many of my larger tanks to reduce aggression: more energy spent on fighting the current, the less on beating each other!

I have also found aggression lessened, with more current, especially with species like, T tuba, seioboldi, and some of the Vieja and X Vieja types.
And also consider a streamlined, natural looking individual, better than bulky, flabby, overfed, couch potatoes.

 

[dogofwar]

The "lake side" wild fish vs. the actual collected from the lake wild fish debate is just one more level of pointlessness of all of this: As if anyone could know or differentiate if a fish is bred in a vat next to Lake Malawi or actually collected in the lake itself.

It has nothing to do with the fish and everything to do with the people who want to claim that their fish is "the best" (and others are, somehow, "genetically inferior.")

There's long been a question whether certain 'wild' imports are actually collected from wild waters or from enclosures of one type or another, more often with rift lake species than South American. Some fish farmers are more responsible and more up front about their policies than others. This interview with Pierre Brichard's daughter Mireille is well known in some circles (it's in English once Mireille appears at about 1:57), where she explains their collection vs breeding policies-- very enlightening regarding the advantages of captive bred vs. wild with certain species.

A few years after the interview, her husband died and she closed the long running facility.

 

[Cichlid savage II]

The "lake side" wild fish vs. the actual collected from the lake wild fish debate is just one more level of pointlessness of all of this: As if anyone could know or differentiate if a fish is bred in a vat next to Lake Malawi or actually collected in the lake itself.

It has nothing to do with the fish and everything to do with the people who want to claim that their fish is "the best" (and others are, somehow, "genetically inferior.")

Agreed!

 

[neutrino]

I have also found aggression lessened, with more current, especially with species like, T tuba, seioboldi, and some of the Vieja and X Vieja types.
And also consider a streamlined, natural looking individual, better than bulky, flabby, overfed, couch potatoes.

+1

 

[Potato Patatto]

I haven’t seen the push for freshwater species yet but generally it seems the saltwater community prefers CB due to the environmental impact of WC fish. Don’t think it has taken much hold in the freshwater, WC seems to be preferred for some of the reasons listed above. It seems a decent amount of freshwater fish haven’t been successfully bred in cap yet outside of the community variants