One thing that I wanted to add to this discussion, is the fact that tank or pond raised, doesn't always equate to tank
bred, even though the term "domestic" could apply. While that may seem confusing to some, if you read post #74 in the following past discussion this should make more sense.
http://monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/threads/clown-loach-breeding-and-export-study.175030/page-3
The person that posted about the "rice" size clown loaches being collected, then raised in ponds, and later sold during the dry season, lives in Indonesia and at one time worked in the aquatic trade there. Irwin's first hand experience in this area is priceless, and is exactly why I contacted him to post in that past discussion.
During its season, you can collect WC hundred thousands of CL in borneo. This making the production of induced breeding clown loach is not profitable considering high cost of induced breeding production. Producing and raising them into saleable size very costly. During the wc collecting season, the sales price of CL is much lower than cost of producing the using induced breeding. So it wont be profitable. The only profitable way to sale CB CL is during the off season when the CL price hit the highest price. However, for big trader, where they have very proper facility, they prefer collect WC CL during the harvest season and sale some. So they will banking the CL stock and release some in the off season. That why CB CL in Indonesia is very small
Talking about the way of harvesting CL in Sumatra and borneo. In Sumatra the people is very skilled in collecting very tiny CL. It's like a rice-size and raise it in the pond. So, when Borneo in in the off season, they will release the CL to market. While in borneo, the people only harvest ¾ inch above. During the season of Borneo CL, trader prefer to buy borneo CL than Sumatra CL. Even one of big exporter in Sumatra also buy CL and Tiger fish from Borneo.
This was also stated by another source approx. 15 yrs ago, in an article posted by a biodiversity research group, from the University of Singapore.
http://lkcnhm.nus.edu.sg/biodiversitii/bio/aquarium_more.html
Some dealers now culture clown loaches. Often, fishermen are able to trap individuals smaller than two cm. These are cheap and too small to be marketable but if they are grown out, a profit of up to 300% or more can be realised if a juvenile of 1.5 cm is raised to 3 cm. Juveniles exhibit incredible growth rates. A doubling in size is discernible in a week, if sufficient food, adequate aeration and filtration are provided. Some exporters also keep excess stock to grow out and sell later at higher prices when the fish is not in stock and prices are high.
To the best of my knowledge there is only 1 aquatic company that has successfully bred clown loaches in captivity in North America, BioAquatix based in South Florida. For reasons already explained their juvenile numbers are limited, and the cost listed on their website for 2" juvies (what Spencer currently has listed) is $18 USD, per fish, which is approx. three times the price Spencer has his listed at. They also currently have 50 in stock at that size, at least according to their website. So probably safe to rule them out as the source of these "domestic" CL's, unless they are blowing them out at less than $5 per piece, shipping included, which is rather doubtful.
So let's assume they came from Asia, along with some of the other various "domestic" Asian fish that he currently has listed, which could easily equate to a large fish dealer in Asia growing out thousands of rice sized CL's to later sell for a nice profit during the dry season. In Borneo & Sumatra CL season doesn't even begin until later in the rainy season when the CL's are returning from spawning. The rainy season typically runs from Nov-March.
So even if a vendor in NA imported some small CL's from an Asian supplier that were listed as domestic, that certainly is no proof that the fish were bred in captivity. This is certainly not a shot at Spence, or anyone else importing or selling these fish and listing them as domestic - I am only attempting to explain how easily that could happen, with juveniles collected in the wild, and then grown out in captivity.
HTH
