Things are getting crazy here - Time to act

[OldMan]

There is a new bill in the US that you may not have heard about. It will ban almost all fish from aquariums and most other pets except cats and dogs. The pet industry has published this description http://www.pijac.org/files/public/US_HR_669.pdf
The official version that will be considered in congress can be viewed here http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin ... ih.txt.pdf

[fischkringli]

That isnt crazy! Its mad!
The reasons arent good and and the same with the idea.

[MatsP]

Uhoh. It lists gold-fish, so that's safe then.

Just about any other foreign creature is probably plausible to list as a possible invasive species.

--
Mats

[worton[pl]]

Hey,

sorry but I think there is no even the smallest reason to worry.
In Poland, where we have really stupid people in government who can only bark at each other without doing absolutly nothing to fix our not the best situation besides blaming for all this crap people from opossite party this kind of ideas come up often .
There is absolutely no way that this kind of bill has any chances to be positively considered - look at it as another stupid idea of too bored person .
For example for 4-5 years new parties, new politicians (there will be always someone with this "splendid" idea) have been trying to ban poisonus animals in Poland. Why? Because they are dangerous :]. Now there is over 1 000 000 registered keeprs who have deadly snakes, spieders, scorpions and another 1 000 000 or even more not registered in a country as small as Poland - imagine numbers for USA.
Now banning means if you are a registered keeper you have to do 2 things. You have to give your precious animals which you keep for many years to a veterinary who will kill them on in the best option put it into some kind shelter where they will eventually die without proper conditions or you may unregister and 99% of now registered keepers and breeders with YEARS of experience who really know how to handle this super deadly snake or spider will unregister rather than let their animals to die.
Of course there is still arguments about kids buyig deadly snakes (you may buy Crotalus or Vipera in Czech for about 3-4$ - Czech are so close from Poland that you may go there, buy a snake and come back within 12 hours by train - but kids are kids they will buy them anyway or even more after banning. The same goes for second argument - possibility of destroying native species - there were, are and will be people who don't think to much and will buy an animal just to throw it away 2-3 months later, it cannot be helped, definitely ban won't help.
It's just stupid bill which has no chance to be reality

Regards.

[Bas Pels]

I can only agree with Worton

a permit system could, perhaps, work. A ban against selling poisonous animals to children might perhaps work (their brothers might help them out, however) but it never helps to criminalize people for their hobby

After all, if I already break the law having fishes (I will not give up my fishes) than it will become much easier to break the law again on another subject, which might be important

[pleco_breeder]

For those outside the US, you have to understand that there is already a negative list in most states, aka fish you cannot keep. All snakeheads are banned on the national level, among other things. In Arizona, and probably other states, all freshwater stingrays are banned. Limiting fish is nothing new. The issue with this bill is that it wants to go from the current system where a species shows a threat before being banned to a system where everything is banned till it can be shown that it does not pose a risk to any ecosystem type within the US. To show how far that reaches, all Loricariidae would be banned because of known invasive species and evidence of erosion in a couple rivers in Hawaii. Even though none of the species would survive a northern winter, they pose a risk in a portion of the country or governed territories. Any species which would have the ability to hybridize with another and weaken the genetic population, there are native cichlid species as well as documented isolated Xiphorus populations which may or may not be indigenous, would never make it to the positive list either. Most of the species on a hobby list would never be allowed under the proposed guidelines and if anyone wanted to find a way to legally get a species they wanted, they would have to fight through red-tape showing that it cannot survive or reproduce in ANY ecosystem which falls under the control of the US government. If it can reproduce in any water type, then it is capable of competing with native species for food and territorial resources. Therefore, it's not allowed.

Larry

[Mike_Noren]

My fear is that the hobby will over time shift from a negative list ("you may not keep these") to a far more restrictive positive list ("you may keep these").
And I'm pretty sure that's the direction things are heading.

[pleco_breeder]

That is exactly what this bill will do if it passes. I don't think most people actually realize that something as simple as competing for food if an escape occurs will restrict the species from the list. And it doesn't even have to be a local threat. If it can live in Florida, Guam, or Hawaii, it's an environmental threat and cannot be placed on the allowed species list.

Larry

[OldMan]

The biggest threat that I see to the hobby in the US is that the same rules about fish will apply in Alaska and American Samoa. The environments being considered are so diverse that proving a fish is safe in your own area will mean nothing. Most tropical fish and plants cannot survive the winters where I live but they could easily survive in a tropical environment. That means it would be banned in a very large area for vulnerability in a small area. As someone pointed out, this is changing from a fish being destructive and banned locally to banning all fish until you can prove that it is not a threat anywhere. Since it specifically requires scientific evidence, all of the L numbers and C numbers that do not yet have a scientific identity can automatically be assumed to be dangerous until the scientific community takes an interest in them and describes them, then studies them and finally determines that they cannot be invasive.
This backwards way of looking at safety is like saying, 100 years ago, that until electricity can be proved safe, there will be none allowed. How much research would there have been into electricity if it was not being used by most of the population daily. The scientists might still be working to develop a light bulb if one of them was very inspired by the banned energy form. Even if the knowledge could be raised to the levels of knowledge we have today, would you be able to certify, based on scientific evidence that electricity is safe? It is inherently not safe but it has benefits that many of us rank as more important than the risk involved in using it.
I see no trade off in this bill between risks and benefits. It one-sidedly says that unless I can prove that a fish is safe in almost any environment, I can't own it. It does not talk about balance or the benefits that might derive from keeping a fish. Much of the early investigation into cancer was done using swordtails as laboratory animals because it was known that certain cross breeds of swordtails developed cancer very often. I would not like to give back what was learned from these fish while waiting to prove they were safe in any environment from tropical to subarctic. Let's get real, that would not and never will happen. I am sure that an environment somewhere in the US and its territories can be shown to be vulnerable to damage by the common aquarium swordtail.

[racoll]

So this will effectively destroy the aquarium hobby in the States.

But as Worton says, what are the chances of this kind of bill being passed?

I can't imagine that they would just crush a multi-million dollar industry with this kind of action.

Perhaps the solution is some sort of permit/licence system whereby you have to show a card of qualification before you can buy a live fish.

To get the card you would have to say, sit and watch a 1 hour educational DVD about basic fishkeeping responsibilities (invasive species, filtration etc) before taking an easy multiple choice test.

Sounds tough, and just imagine what rags like the Daily Mail would have to say (nanny state gone mad!), but if people can't be trusted.....

I do see this as a much better solution than blanket bans on imports.

[worton[pl]]

Hello,

really interesting topic. But I'm still shocked that US government come up with this kind of idea.
With poisonus animals and our cold climate things were down to responsibility of keepers - things were easy, all we have to do was show society and officials that we are not stupid and we really do care for our pets.
In this situation problem is much bigger. I will write how things are working in Poland now - maybe you will be able to do it as well.
We have a bill that prohibid keeping any animal listed on a special list. We were unable to prevent making of this bill. However a list itself is a bill that also has to be made by voting in government. Thanks to a massive actions of keepers all around Poland including lots of lectures, meetings with officials and manifestations in Capital (imagine an official holding on shoulders 4m long Python ) we were able to stop this bill list and without a list first bill means nothing. And yes in 2 years we will have new president, new government, new parties and new officials and someone for sure will dig up this list again but if you showed once that you are not single person but really huge community of really educated and determined hobbysts things are much easier. All this need some work but hey I think it is well worth trying.
I don't know the situation in USA now really well. But I'm more than sure that cutting down woods, regulating rivers, using pesticides, high nutrition fertilizers, using foil bags - generally being a human does much more damage to a natural environment than keeping fish.

Ah and registration system is good idea if you take in consideration poisonus animals - imho is the best idea to keep those animals.
However with fish it is not so good. I really like restaurants, pubs, offices with beautiful planted tanks with some colourfull, little gems in it. And after started registration system things will get much more complicated, probably too much for not a real "geek".

Regards.

[pleco_breeder]

I am sure that an environment somewhere in the US and its territories can be shown to be vulnerable to damage by the common aquarium swordtail.

If it can reproduce in any water type, then it is capable of competing with native species for food and territorial resources. Therefore, it's not allowed.

Several people on other forums, groups, and mailing lists I subscribe to have decided to overlook what the actual possibilities of this bill are. Most are using phrases such as common sense and politicians in the same sentence I seriously doubt that this bill will pass as there has been a long list of pet groups that have supposedly made their stake to their representatives, myself included. However, the groups that are backing this bill (PETA, The Nature Conservancy, and the Humane Society that I know of) also have a great deal of reach and a lot deeper pockets. These bills will continue to come in till a system that actually works is figured out. I initially wanted a by state program as an alternative, but that type of program has been in use in most of the country for a very long time and the proponents of this bill are obviously not happy with that or we wouldn't be facing this. There is going to be a change occur at some point in time. The question is whether there is a middle ground that can satisfy everyone involved.

Larry

[MatsP]

I guess one of the problems with "per state" systems is that it's much easier to check what is going into the whole of the country from outside the country, than to understand what is being shipped where within the country - I haven't crossed more than about 15-20 state borders (by car, I have crossed most of the US in an aeroplane at one point or another) within the US, but in every single case, there's been absolutely no sign of "border control". So once you have species X within the borders, you have no idea where it's going (we have to assume that people aren't necessarily very knowledgable about these matters - and that some people will intentionally break the law to make a buck or five).

I agree, that a solution that makes MOST of the interested parties somewhere between happy and not unhappy is what must be achieved. That's what a democracy is all about, right? You can't always make all parties happy, but making most of them satisfied/not-to-unhappy is a good goal to achieve.

--
Mats

[Mike_Noren]

You know, offhand I can't think of a single species of fish which would not be able to survive in the wild somewhere in the US.
I mean, there's already feral Discus living in a warm spring.

[MatsP]

You know, offhand I can't think of a single species of fish which would not be able to survive in the wild somewhere in the US.
I mean, there's already feral Discus living in a warm spring.

Marine reef fishes would be a POSSIBLE one. Parasitic fish that require a PARTICULAR host perhaps? But I'm definitely grasping at straws here.

And the number of mamals, insects and reptiles that are DEFINITELY not able to reproduce in the wild SOMEWHERE in the US [even if we count only continental US] is probably a single-digit number as well.

The union of those animals and the ones suitable as pets is quite likely zero.

--
Mats

[fischkringli]

MatsP wrote:

Marine reef fishes would be a POSSIBLE one. Parasitic fish that require a PARTICULAR host perhaps?

Or water with Ph under 6,5 needing fish like chocolate gouramis.

And if some mamals are set in the wilderness, there isnt any chance, that they could reproduce themself is there?

[Mike_Noren]

Marine reef fishes would be a POSSIBLE one.

Yeah, but then again: http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/li ... 28.html#cr
And there's also some less disruptive marine introductions on caribbean reefs, e.g. some damsels and jawfish.

Or water with Ph under 6,5 needing fish like chocolate gouramis.

To be honest I doubt there are any fish which absolutely demand water with pH below 6.5, but even so such waters are pretty common also in the US, e.g. the Okefenokee swamp has a pH of 4.

[apistomaster]

I just got off the phone after speaking to an aid of my Congresional Representative, Cathy McMorris Rodgers(R) by calling her WA DC office.

I informed her of HR 669 and the fact that the non-voting Congressional Representative from the Territory of Guam has introduced this ridiculous bill in subcommittee.

I explained to her that the aquarium hobby is second only to sports fishing in total dollars spent in this country and should this bill become law it would create wide spread unemployment of many workers in the pet trade as well as put 10's of thousands of small pet shops out of business.
I explained to her that under this law, keeping and raising even Guppies would become illegal.
I also explained that each state already has laws regulating which species are banned based on their possible viability and what may be best for Hawaii was not applicable to the State of Washington. That there are already plenty of federal laws and CITES treaty agreements we in the United states already honor.

I told her which animals were allowed under the proposed law and that it has been the cattle, sheep, swine and other farm animals that are largely responsible for the introduction and spread of noxious weeds, invasive, non-native pest plants and that such plants are a larger problem and are not even addressed in this bill.
I also pointed out that the most serious invasive and harmful fish that have been introduced to the waters of the united states were not brought in by the pet trade but by governmental agencies. These agencies have introduced European Carp, Asian Grass carp, English sparrows, European starlings just to name a few. Then they went on to introduce eastern brook trout and spiny ray Fish like bass, Sunfish and many species of catfish to the west thus harming native Cutthroat Trout and the endangered Bull Trout. Then in the reverse, Western rainbow trout and the Brown trout were introduced to waters east of the Mississippi which resulted in nearly wiping out their native Brook Trout.

My call was the first her office had heard of this misguided bill, HR 669.
As a result, I think it registered with her. Of course she said she would bring this to my representative's attention, that part is standard boiler plate response to most any call. but I think as our Representatives begin to hear more, and you know that some must keep fish or other pets and if not, they certainly have family members who are fish and pet keepers, I think they will not allow this bill to ever see the light of day.

To be sure, everyone should call or write to their Representatives to ensure that we raise their awareness of this bill and it's personal and financial implications.

I am retired early due to a disability and keeping and breeding tropical fish is one of the few hobbies I am still able to pursue. I will not go down without a fight.

[vince0]

After reading through all of the posts and replies, only one thought came to mind.

Thank god i live in Canada.

Actually two thoughts, I also agree with everyones very informend oppinion on this issue

[OldMan]

Vince, don't take too much solace in living in Canada. Have you ever noticed how much Ottawa follows along with what Washington does as far as "environmental" laws? I don't think there is any real original environmental thought in either of those places. If one acts the other thinks it is a good idea and cites the actions of the other one as evidence to support their own new bill. I hate to think how many bad laws have propagated across that particular border by one group of legislators, House of Commons or Legislature, copying the other.

[andywoolloo]

I sent emails to my representative and my two senators. If you want to, this email I got from drsfosterandsmith tells how. Scroll to the bottom for links to find your reps and senators.

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/general.c ... HR669-_-P1