cleaner wrasse

[justinl]

Laurie, yup, absolutely, I agree that anecdotal information is important. I'm just voicing my opinion as well; I did not mean to discredit anyone's experience. Maybe I'm biased towards wild fish just because that's what I study and plan to be my career (marine fish biology), but looking at things in a broader perspective, I can't say I agree with the importance of fish in a tank.

For argument's sake, let us imagine what would happen if cleaner wrasses went extinct or declined to the point where their function as a cleaner fish was rendered nonfunctional. Parasitic copepod and isopod events could go up exponentially (or maybe not at all... i hope we don't have to find out) leading to shortened lifespan of animals. Greater occurences of the same parasites as these adult fish are brought into our hobby. Increased natural mortality of adult fish, perhaps pushing the less disease resistant species from their precarious hold onto the endangered list and out into the abyss of the extinct list. Are you familiar with the current farmed salmon parasitic copepod issue? Perhaps there will be so damn many parasites, that they will occur in fatal density on juvenile fish; juveniles are less resistant to parasites so mortality will increase before they even mature and contribute to future stock. Such mortality might decrease fish populations inciting an allee effect, in which a species' population is brought to such low levels that they are doomed to spiral into extinction due to low genetic diversity, such low densities that they can't find each other to mate etc. And finally, as more and more fish go extinct or become endangered because we decided cleaner wrasses could be exterminated from the reefs, said fish will become unavailable to the trade. Politicians and scientists will rage on the hobby until it is choked by restrictions until it finally dies out. As you can (hopefully) see, we CANNOT pretend that we are a separate body from wild stock of fish. like it or not, you are very close to wild fish.

let us set emotions and attachments to our fish aside. After all they're really just artifacts of human nature and have no real meaning in the long run... well, except negative effects. I mean, if we had never evolved beyond the "ape" status, the world would be much better off. But I digress. Sans emotions, let us be mechanically logical and look at numbers. Okay, how many fish do you have in your tank besides you cleaner wrasse? Ten? Alright so let us assume the wrasse treats them all. Now conversely, how many fish could the same wrasse have cleaned in the wild? Hundreds, maybe thousands in its lifetime! That's a lot of happy fish. Why should your fish (who will not contribute one iota to future stock and in the long run means nothing at all), be any more important than wild fish? Like it or not, they're less important. I don't mean to be abrasive, but I can't say I care what your heart says; use your brain.

Another thing I have to bring up is image. Image is everything these days. When aquarists say things like "my fish are more important than wild stocks", first I get depressed at the lack of perspective. Then I get angry and frightened because it is exactly this that will shut down our hobby, ruin wild stocks of fish and just basically make us all have a really bad day. All your non-reefer friends will see this attitude and they'll assume we all feel that way; the danger here is that the non-reefers are in power. The non-reefers outnumber us and they will be the ones to pass judgement on us according to what image we present them. Why do you think there is such a big push for aquaculture in our hobby? Why do you think we frown so much on noobs who make impulse buys and/or don't do their homework properly? Because a lot of us realize that this hobby we love so has such significant effects in the wild... and if we continue doing the same as we are now, we will be shut down one way or another. Whether by extinctions of animals or death by legislation is irrelevant; it's just a matter of time unless we change.

hmm... this thread is rapidly veering off-topic. oh wellz.

[justinl]

these walls of text are killing me to write. I hope you're actually reading the damned things.

my2rotties, chill. I don't know where you got the impression that I'm bashing you from... I mean my statements to be general, not targeted. That said, you're still ignoring the fact that wild stocks (which FAR outnumber the fish in your tank) are now deprived of the same service. How is it not cruel to hamstring an important ecosystem function, further restricting the hobby's only resource of ALL fish? How is that not cruel to any reefer in our hobby? How is that not cruel to future hobbyists who would like to join? Until someone comes up with a decent rebuttal to that, I'm not even going to think about changing my mind regarding this species.

I know this will sound abrasive, but to think that fish in tanks are more important than wild fish is incredibly arrogant. I can't think of a more suitable word than that. naive is a close second though.

as long as people buy a fish, they supply the demand for it. As long as there's a demand, collectors will collect it; so in the end, it's the reefers who are responsible for what is collected. This topic has been beat to death already. This hobby is selfish by nature, I do agree, but it does not have to be destructive as well. Buying second hand/aquacultured is great, I fully encourage that practice.

as for their being essential to a tank with fish, look at how many successful tanks don't have cleaner wrasses in them and say that again.

edit: when I say "you" in my posts, I don't mean you. I mean yooooouuuuuu in the general sense. I had hoped that would have been assumed. Like I said, I'm not here to bash anyone; I'm not Jesus (believe it or not ), I have no right to pass judgement

[fishoholic]

justinl you make very valid points and obviously you are passionate about the fish in the wild. I understand you're concern about people demanding cleaner wrasses and eventually them starting to become extinct. Just so you know I hope that doesn't happen and if (to you it's probably more of a when but to me it's an if) cleaner wrasse's are put on a list saying they are becoming endangered I will not buy one. I hope that they are able to reproduce effectively in the wild so that day will never happen, and even better, I hope that some day they will be captively bred.

When aquarists say things like "my fish are more important than wild stocks", I'm not saying my fish are more important (after all they came from the wild) I'm just saying that to me they are as important, after all I didn't know them when they were in the wild, but only came to know them after I brought them home. This caused me to have an emotional connection to my fish. If one of the fish in my tank dies I will be sad. If a fish in the wild dies I probably wont even be aware of when it happened even though I know fish die in the wild every day.

For example: if a grandparent dies in another part of the world, sure it's sad, but I didn't know the person and I probably wont grieve over them. However if my grandparent was to die I would grieve for a long time. To me life is all about personal and emotional connections. I have that with my fish I don't have it with the fish in the wild, maybe you do, I'm not sure but it seems like it. Not saying my opinion is right or wrong but for me it's just keeping it real and being honest.

I'm sure I'm probably frustrating you justinl (and probably some others as well) and I apologize for that, it wasn't my intent, but I like playing Devils advocate every now and then and I do enjoy a good debate. So again justinl,

Anyway the original point of this thread was:

are these fish as hard to keep as people say....im thinking of getting one since my peppermint or coral banded shrimp keep killing my cleaner shrimp i put in so thinking of another route of fish cleaning...thanks

My short answer would have to be: No they are not as hard to keep as some people say they are. Just find one that is already eating mysis and or nori (most reputable fish stores will feed the fish upon request) and as long as you find one that's eating you shouldn't have problems keeping this fish.

This was my original thread asking about other options because I was having ich issues and I knew people said cleaner wrasses are bad to buy and don't do well etc.

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/sho...cleaner+wrasse

I bought my cleaner wrasse July 21 2008 (the cleaner wrasse that I bought had been at the lfs for over a month and was eating mysis and was half the price of the neon gobies the store was selling) naesco told me (and I quote) "As you know, the chances that the clearner wrasse you bought lasting more than a few weeks are remote." Well needless to say he is still alive and well and fatter then ever.

This is a pic. of my cleaner from when I first bought him. He is definitely fatter now, but he still was a good size then.

[IMG][/IMG]

[blueyota]

im not worried about ich as i have none....i am just looking for a good cleaner as i feel its good for the health of the fish and also keeps aggression down in the tank

[fishoholic]

Originally Posted by blueyota

im not worried about ich as i have none....i am just looking for a good cleaner as i feel its good for the health of the fish and also keeps aggression down in the tank

Well in that case I would sell the coral banded shrimp as he is most likely the one killing the cleaner shrimp (I have kept peppermint shrimp and cleaner shrimp together with out any problems for over a year, so I doubt it's him) and I would buy some more cleaner shrimp.