I see lots of people selling leopoldis from all over but i was under the understanding that they were on the endangered list so our these leopoldis they're selling for real can i even import?
Leopoldi
- Thread starter KingGatorGar
- Start date
Leopoldi and stingrays in general from Brazil were subject to an export ban put in place by the Brazilian government who were concerned that they were being fished unsustainably (quite rightly). That was lifted to some degree earlier this year and a quota system was in operation meaning limited numbers of certain fish were allowed to be exported. I guess they will have done some sort of sustainability research on the reproduction rates to come up with figures but if you think your average tetra can probably produce 100s of offspring at one time where as a stingray probably has a max fecunity of 20-30 in a year you can see the impending issue.
To add to the mix last week the government agreed the go ahead for a series of Dams accross the Xingu where the ray is from you can tell thats going to have some impact on not only Leopoldi stingrays but also H.zebra catfish as well and may lead to extiction (worse case scenario)
To add to the mix last week the government agreed the go ahead for a series of Dams accross the Xingu where the ray is from you can tell thats going to have some impact on not only Leopoldi stingrays but also H.zebra catfish as well and may lead to extiction (worse case scenario)
sea7ray;4433100; said:
That's one way to look at it. The other is that the Brazilian government got wise to the fact that they were sitting on a goldmine and decided to exploit the hell out of it.
Considering local people kill river rays as pests, how concerned does the government truly need to be about the few hundred that are sold to hobbyists?
sea7ray;4433288; said:
Haha and a sarcastic Brit? Who would've ever thought
Sustainability comes second to profit. Just take a look at how many pleco species are still unidentified (i.e. sp.). If sustainability were the key concern, I'd imagine there'd be a quicker push to categorize and study native species.
And Pete is right, rays are viewed as pests by locals. Our demand for them + the government quota has driven the price, not their scarcity.
i would disagree to some extent...its bloody easy to categorise fish in North America, people have been doing it for centuries and to be honest piscine diversity both there and here in the uk is tiny compared to Brazil (there are only 50 species of fw fish in the UK and half of them were introduced!) Brazil has thousands of miles of rivers and much of the area that surrounds them is uninhabited. Both North America and the UK are also in a place where we quite probably wiped out a lot of undescribed species though industrialisation and the change in habitat (if we in the UK could wipe out bears, wolves and beavers from the UK im sure as hell that we've lost a few fish along the way).
I guess what im trying to say is that i agree that some part of the Brazilian government is thinking $/£/E but there are government lead projects also set up that are actively looking to protect their fisheries and thinking about sustainability in the richest fish diverse river system there is.
Oh and i appreciate the fact that my posts are taken in the right way! Cheers fellas (and lasses)
I guess what im trying to say is that i agree that some part of the Brazilian government is thinking $/£/E but there are government lead projects also set up that are actively looking to protect their fisheries and thinking about sustainability in the richest fish diverse river system there is.
Oh and i appreciate the fact that my posts are taken in the right way! Cheers fellas (and lasses)