Wild Seahorses @ J&L??!!

[Beverly]

Originally Posted by teevee

Your very own UBC is part of http://www.projectseahorse.org, as is Guylian, one of the world's largest and most well-known chocolate manufacturers - looks like only those crazy greens are in on this one eh?

On the sh.org board, very little positive is said about Project Seahorse. They are one of the most influential bodies in the Cites evaluation of seahorses, yet they are not quite as knowledgeable as they claim to be.

One of the Cites proposals they have made is to make it illegal to catch SHs under 4", regardless of a particular species adult size. Dwarf SHs, for example, are only an inch in length at adult size, yet they are not endangered. The SHs I keep, H. whitei, only grow to 4" in length, so this species would not be available for collection at all, and as far as I know they are not endangered. There are other a few other species whose adult size is 4" or under and all of them would be exempt from collection.

Not that I am in favour of mass collection of wild seahorses at all. But if there are to be breeding programs around the world to lessen the impact of SHs used for TCM and of SHs for the aquarium trade, there must be some wild collection at various points to ensure genetic variation in the captive bred animals, especially for those in the aquarium trade.

JMO.