House Bill HR 4928

[dizzy]

At least this thread got you to finally admit MAMTI really does exist. :wink: Strange how it got left out of the Newsletter.

Like I was hiding it from you on purpose. Why do you give things a conspiratorial spin? What is the function of that?

Look John I have heard that CCIF is going to use one particular wholesaler and not the others even if they are MAC certified. I have a hard time understanding how this is fair. I read a paper titled "Tranforming the Marine Ornamentals Industry: A Business Approach." A group got together from the conservation community and developed a plan to change our industry. What is that called? Only a few select companies were invited to play. A certain very vocal and MIA MAC critic was at one time to be the Golden Child importer but got jilted for another on 104th st. Yeah I might do some fishing at times, but it does help to bring some of this stuff out into the main stream. I'm trying to help enlightened people like Norm. What's the harm?

 

[Kalkbreath]

Peter. Most of the fish stocks in PI have been tainted with cyanide..................{ Its the three and a half billion[3,500,000,000] kilos a year of cyanide collected food fish} ..{compare that to our our hobby which only collects fifty kilos a year}......thats why false readings are common in the testing. No one will ever test out one-hundred percent clean ....{when a MAC net fishermen unknowingly collects a second hand exposed fish } CITES and Australian fisheries already watch over the world coral trade........There is little proof that any additional measures are needed.........can you list any? There are fifteen plus aquaculture set ups now growing corals world wide. {'there were only two five years ago} Eighty percent of pet clams are aquacultured as of 2004......yet only 20 percent of the food clams are aquacultured. People eat 10,000 wild collected giant clams for every one collected for the trade. Pet fish and coral collectors collect food fish and clams when there is no market for pet fish . Giving the natives no choice but to collect more food fish is bad for the reefs .

 

[naesco]

If any of you industry types feel that this development is anything less that the prohibition of the import of fish from the Philippines and Indonesia where the use of cyanide is rampant you better sell off right now.

The only way to save the industry and the hobby is a 100% reform in your current ways of doing business. Sadly this will not happen as industry trys to justify it position or engage is symantics.

Do you understand that you will NOT be able to import fish or coral that has little hope of survival in hobbyists tanks?
Do you understand that the import of live rock in over?

A CDT will be mandatory and those who get caught will lose their licences .

This development is long overdue and will be a priority. I sincerely hope that further import information is allowed. I hope that testimony( willing or unwilling) of the experts is asked.

I, as a hobbyist clued into 'Industry's dirty little secret', will be there with bells ringing.

 

[PeterIMA]

Kalk, I don't believe that the fact that a fish exposed to cyanide by one fishery (food) excapes and is caught to produce positive results (when caught with a net by an aquarium fish collector) has any bearing on the so-called false-postives that Merck supposedly encountered at BFAR. But, I am not sure since I don't know exactly what they did or did not do with regard to cyanide testing.

Your ideas on clams are interesting but off topic.

Peter

 

[Kalkbreath]

No, the topic is why are these particular people pushing reform of our industry. These same people spend so much energy stopping Coral collection and live rock collection places like Florida .........Yet there is less live coral in Florida and the rest of the Caribbean today then before they spent all those years worrying about the tiny amount of aquarium live rock collected I have yet to see anything but a D-minus report card on efforts by the USCRTF ........ they should have been focusing on the real problems facing the reefs .For some reason they dont ? It seems these people purposely divert attention on the real issues and attack our tiny industry........ So they must be in it not for the reefs , but to attain personal power and or and wealth. ...Thats not called "reeform" ...............thats called " business reorganization" .....They need to be able to explain why they chose to "pick " on the us ? The ONLY industry that is actually actively changing the way it farms the reefs? Why the hell is twenty new coral farms and ten clam farms not sufficient progress in the last five years? Explain why CITES and Australian fisheries are not more suitable overseers of the coral trade ? Then explain what progress the much bigger Food fish industry has done to change the way it effects the reefs? And why if the USCRTF really cares for the reefs why it has chosen to pick on us and not go after the real the real killers of the reef? Every aspect of our reef collection from fish..... to live rock..... to clams is dwarfed by other industries . In the last ten years a thousand times more live rock was used to build roads and houses with then our tiny collection totals .......A thousand times more giant clams were plucked to eat ........and thousands times more fish collected with blasts and squirts to be used as food then to be placed in aquariums .......Yet, these people think it is our industry that needs the most immediate intervention .........They need to explain in front of congress the logic behind such ?

 

[coralfarmin]

kalk you forgot about all the rock used to make airport runways

we dont need to hinder that do we??

 

[dizzy]

There's your contact CF. :wink:

 

[coralfarmin]

I have seen both public and private runways jutting out into the ocean.
unreal

 

[coralfarmin]

I believe that the removal of rock has even caused death to people because of flooding from waves that would have been broken down by the reef

but supposedly rock for the hobby is from deeper water or only peices that have broken away already

what are the rock walls islanders build called you see going out into the ocean every so far down their beach(Jetty) ? Man one of them could supply the industry a while.
I could care less if they stop rock collection we can do without that.
but I dont think we put a dent in collection if the actual truth were told

 

[JennM]

Kalk wrote:

..{compare that to our our hobby which only collects fifty kilos a year}

Only 50 kilos? Of PI fish??

Cripey the MO industry takes more than that! 50 kg is approximately 113.5 lbs.

Kalk-ulus strikes again :roll:

 

[Anonymous]

I remember his Kalk-ulus, he is refferring to his assertsions that in body weight, not water weight, we only take 150 pounds of fish. He's still wrong, but what are you going to do?

 

[JennM]

Well I suppose it would take a lot of wafer-thin P. hepatus to make 150 lbs... :roll: But one of the fish I got last week had to be a 2-pounder.

Jenn

 

[Anonymous]

Maybe dried weight then?

2 pounder, kricky, that sucker can do some damage.

 

[Kalkbreath]

Okey, I left off the "thousand" ......50 thousand kilos...one third of the fish from PI tested for cyanide. Even less during the most recent test years. That would come out to about one million fish . Half were damsels so whats the weight of 500,000 damsels? .........750,000 ounces ? ........then the remaining 500,000 fish were mostly ,dart fish , mandarines, blennies , gobies etc.......these remaining fish would weight in at about 1,000,000 ounces or two ounces each ...........how many kilos is 1,750,000 ounces? ..............109,000 pounds.................compare that number to this :

Poison and profits: cyanide fishing in the Indo-Pacific - includes related articles
Environment, Oct, 1998 by Charles Victor Barber, Pratt. Vaughan R.

A board the Morning Sun in the grey Hong Kong dawn just before Christmas 1997, a stocky Chinese stevedore stood waist-deep in a tank with dozens of furiously thrashing napoleon wrasse, one of the most spectacular of Asia's coral reef fishes. One by one, he wrestled the fish, some weighing nearly 30 kg. into a scoop net and into the hands of his co-workers on the dock above. Weighed and sold right on the dock for as much as $90 per kilogram, the fish were hustled off in minutes into waiting trucks equipped with their own holding tanks. By evening, some of them would be sold to elite Hong Kong diners willing to pay up to $180 per kilogram - and up to $225 per plate for the wrasse's lips, the most prized of reef fish delicacies.

By the time the Morning Sun had unloaded, some 20 tons of live reef fish - 8 tons of napoleon wrasse and 12 tons of assorted grouper species - were on their way to the districts where diners pick their fish from tanks at specialized shops for cooking in adjacent restaurants. The Morning Sun's catch, which came from Indonesian waters, was just a drop in the bucket, however: Some 20,000 tons of live reef food fish were imported into Hong Kong in 1997.(1)

The live fish food industry collects in TWO DAYS the same amount of fish as our hobby collects per year. That doesnt even include the dead food fish industry which is fifty times larger then the live food fish industry or the local self use food industry that feeds 85 million people each week! Other peoples data clearly demonstrates that 1000 times more food fish are collected per day with cyaide then our hobby ........ Where the **** is the USCRTF on this issue?

 

[John_Brandt]

The live fish food industry collects in TWO DAYS the same amount of fish as our hobby collects per year. That doesnt even include the dead food fish industry which is fifty times larger then the live food fish industry or the local self use food industry that feeds 85 million people each week! Other peoples data clearly demonstrates that 1000 times more food fish are collected per day with cyaide then our hobby ........ Where the **** is the USCRTF on this issue?

Jeff, you are confusing the issues and pointing fingers in the wrong places. First, the USCRTF didn't write HR4928, Congressman Ed Case did. He is not the USCRTF. Secondly, The USCRTF is the United States Coral Reef Task Force, whose primary concern is American reefs and America's potential role in the destruction of its reefs and the reefs of other countries. The live reef food fish trade is almost exclusively an Asian one from reef to dinner plate. America neither collects, ships nor eats live reef food fish that have been colected in Southeast Asia. Having said that, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is a member of the USCRTF and is concerned about International threats to foreign reefs that do not necessarily have American "blame". The USAID does fund foreign initiatives to understand and control the live reef food fish trade. But this is entirely unrelated to HR4928 and its scope and priorities.

The USCRTF is quite aware of all of the existing and possible threats to reefs and their list of prioritized causes is accurate. But to say that the USCRTF should not be concerned with American consumption of marine ornamental species and should instead be concerned with the live reef food fish trade is to misunderstand what they are about. You are blaming them for false priorities while ingnoring what their mission and actual priorities are.

 

[John_Brandt]

Yeah I might do some fishing at times, but it does help to bring some of this stuff out into the main stream. I'm trying to help enlightened people like Norm. What's the harm?

There's nothing wrong with discussing topical issues, concerns and opinions. My criticism of you is that you habitually insinuate scandal, conspiracy and dishonesty in individuals who are not guilty of it.

 

[Kalkbreath]

Then would that not put into question whether the USCRTF is more concerned with the image that its helping the reefs then of actually doing so ? What improvements have been shown in the health of Florida's reefs? Zero? Efforts like banning live rock collection and Calling the reefs "sanctuaries " Only detracts from the real issues. Likewise attempting to focus blame our industry in PI for damage mostly not from our collectors is purely an attempt not to help the reefs , but for some other reason? What?

 

[coralfarmin]

John
Do you think that if the bill is passed it will cause companys that manufacture equitment for reef keeping along with those who sell corals to vanish?
What will really happen and how soon?

 

[John_Brandt]

John, Just for clarification.

The MAC Newsletter mentions that tests were done by Merck in the BFAR laboratory. What is not explained is exactly what test methods were evaluated and/or compared. I assume that when you mention ISE that you are referring to the method previously used by the IMA and presently used by BFAR (that is published in Standard Methods for Wate and Wastewater Analysis by the American Publice Health Association, and in other manuals by the American Society of Testing and Materials and the U.S EPA). However, I could be wrong.

Merck has its own colorimetric test procedures. My discussions with Mr. Alvarez indicated that there were problems with the Merck test. The MAC Newsletter may be talking about them.

You failed to mention that Dr. Renneberg in Hong Kong also has a test procedure for measuring thiocyanate in blood samples and has been working under contract to the MAC. He has evaluated and several methods.

None of these evaluations have been provided to me. My understanding is that they were confidential until after the MAC CDT committee (of which I am part) has had time to review them. However, it is the MAC itself that then broke that understanding when it published its statements (quoted by you) in its Newsletter. The Newseletter is ambiguous and does not allow one to make judgements, since it does not clearly indicate what test procedures were used or were being compared.

Peter Rubec

Peter, the ISE CDT methodology that Merck evaluated is essentially that which has been used by BFAR. I should be clear that they found no apparent problems with the apparatus detecting cyanide in fish tissues. What is at issue is the general irregularity and unpredictability of cyanide in the tissues of fishes that have been experientally exposed to sodium cyanide under controlled conditions. The newsletter describes these issues without blaming the test apparatus or test protocol itself.

When you were developing and working on the ISE CDT did you perform controlled experiments of exposing fish to cyanide and measuring the cyanide levels in the tissues afterwards?

I know that developments are underway for the detection of thiocyanate in fish tissues, but I know nothing of the details. You have mentioned in this forum that there may be a thiocyanate test being developed in the USA. What's up with that?

 

[John_Brandt]

Then would that not put into question whether the USCRTF is more concerned with the image that its helping the reefs then of actually doing so ? What improvements have been shown in the health of Florida's reefs? Zero? Efforts like banning live rock collection and Calling the reefs "sanctuaries " Only detracts from the real issues. Likewise attempting to focus blame our industry in PI for damage mostly not from our collectors is purely an attempt not to help the reefs , but for some other reason? What?

It is very difficult to stop anthropic threats to coral reef degradation without trampling "personal freedoms" and commerce. In spite of that, the USCRTF has accomplished (and helped others to accomplish) meaningful actions that have improved situations for American reefs (which include Florida, Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam & Northern Marianas-Saipan).

In my opinion (and would be the case with many others), to stop the degradation and begin the restoration of Florida reefs one would need to shut down "Big Sugar", restore the natural (historic) flow of water through the Everglades, stop most coastal development in South Florida and the Keys, remove the septic systems in the Keys, stop ships from dumping trash and grounding on the reefs, etc.

The USCRTF did not ban Florida wild live rock harvest. The State of Florida did.

The USCRTF is not blaming America for the destruction of Southeast Asian reefs that is done by the live reef food fishery. It does however, know that we are the largest consumer of marine ornamental fish in the world coming from the largest marine ornamental fishery in the world (SE Asia) and that the use of cyanide to capture those fish is relatively widespread in that region. The USCRTF has a trade sub-group that studies and has concerns about that. But even so, the USCRTF does not any longer write laws concerning the marine ornamental trade (since the Coral Reef Act of 2000). And don't forget, that legislation did not make it past Capitol Hill.


The USCRTF has created a list of priority focus areas:

1. Land-based Sources of Pollution
2. Overfishing
3. Lack of Public Awareness
4. Recreational Overuse and Misuse
5. Climate Change and Coral Bleaching
6. Disease

Specific categories of anthropogenic threats are typically:

* Population increases
* Shoreline development
* Increased sediments in the water
* Trampling by tourists and divers
* Ship groundings, pollution, overfishing
* Fishing with poisons and explosives that destroy coral habitat.