The rules about which you are concerned is as follows.
Brazil, who is a signatory to the CITES convention, made a formal request that zebras be placed in the Appendix III listing. Doing this effectively requires that all other signatories to this agreement are nor required to have a certificate of origin for any zebras which are shipped across country borders. This requirement does not apply to fish shipped within a country. I breed zebras and have since 2006. I only sell them in the states. I do not need any certificate to do so. However, if I wanted to send them to Canada or someplace in Europe etc., then such a certificate would be required.
All of this is too little too late if we are to believe what was posted in this thread
viewtopic.php?f=26&t=44585 by husky_jim about his recent trip to the Xingu. I asked "I have another Q if you do not mind. I am wondering if you folks spotted any of the B&W Hypancistrus species, especially zebras?" and this was the reply:
Yes and the zebra situation is disappointing....and not due to the dam.....the biggest threat is the smuggling.....in the places that the best fishermen in the past usually caught 20-30 pieces of L46 now they find only 2 or 3 at best and most of them juvenile.....we must educate ourselves and do not accept any smuggled fish...we must appreciate the captive bred...
after this trip i don't give any chance imo for the zebras to survive in the wild in the next 2-5 years....
I do not really agree with the idea that the dam is not the cause. If not for the dam, the fish would not have been threatened with extinction which drove up demand. The fish have been illegal to remove from Brazil for quite a few years. I never gave the zebras much chance to survive even without the illegal collecting and removal. What may have happened is that enough fish ended up with breeders across the globe to keep the species viable in captivity.
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