Fiji ending coral & LR exports

[Kalkbreath]

The Ministy of Fisheries & Forrests is sending out a Fax,informing all involved ,that on July 15th the Fiji Marine Aquarium Council agreed on the summery of CITES and a hold on all coral and live rock exports is to begin.........Keep in mind that no inspection has ever show the reefs of Fiji are being harmed by the collection of coral or LR, its the paperwork invoved with CITES that is at issue.. The European unions and Canada have refused to buy fijis lumber and fish food exports because CITES has placed Fiji on warning.. Funny that its the lumber and food fish industies which are harming the reefs on these islands yet its coral collection that the Europeans are concerned about? Meanwhile the Fiji Gov. has decided that the aquarium hobby and its coral and live rock exports being such a tiny percent of total export dollars from Fiji,that its just not worth the loss of the lumber and food fish exports being that these two industries make make up 80% of the export. Nice to Know that falling trees and Blast fishing can one again resume on the islands! Ps Thanks to all the people involved with the export estimates four years ago, being that these estimates were later proven to be over stated BY about 100 times.
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recessions in the us
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Spyder MR2

 

[dizzy]

Kalkbreath,

I was talking to one of the Marine Aquarium Council (MAC) officials a while back and he said if the ban goes into effect that even the aquacultured frags that Walt Smith has been doing, would most likely be prevented from being shipped out of Fiji. If it has really come to pass it will have a serious consequence on the price of live rock and acropora colonies.

As of today I still saw very cheap live rock and acropora being offered on wholesale price lists. Is it time to start panic buying and stocking up?

 

[flameangel1]

Isn't it amazing that Figi thinks we are such a small part , and yet we hear that we are doing so much of the damage to the reefs of this world ??
(And Most of our hobby comes from Figi ) :?

Do not think we should start a panic here about stocking up .
We made it after the Deep Gulf ban, and that was shut down before many of us knew it was even coming.

 

[reefland]

It seems like other suppliers in pacific islands will take up the slack.

 

[MandarinFish]

There's always someone willing to exploit nature for a buck.

 

[IcantTHINKofONE]

Will Marshall Island and Tonga still be available? Or are we going to be limited to aquacultured rock from Florida and the Gulf?

 

[reefland]

Or are we going to be limited to aquacultured rock from Florida and the Gulf?

Lets hope not. I hate that stuff. It tooks *years* for that stuff to get coralline covered. All my other rocks were pink/purple with coralline it was growing all over the glass, just would not grow on them TBS rocks for the longest time.

I also had issues where these rocks would grow hair algae yet no other rocks in the system would. Almost tossed them out a few times.

Now 5 years later they blend in nicely.

If your only choice is aquacultered rock or dry rock then aquacultered is the way to go.

 

[oranje]

Well, it's certainly possible to make up "fake" liverock, isn't it? I seem to remember GARF having instructions on creating synthetic baserock for a reef, which in time will turn into standard-issue coraline-covered liverock.

I don't feel a need to stock up... I have enough as it is, and if I ever get around to "upgrading" beyond my 120gal, I'll probably have a swimming pool out back filled with money anyway.

 

[dizzy]

Well, it's certainly possible to make up "fake" liverock, isn't it? I seem to remember GARF having instructions on creating synthetic baserock for a reef, which in time will turn into standard-issue coraline-covered liverock.

I don't believe fake liverock will have the same filtration benefits as real live rock. Real live rock is more than just a structure to place your corals on and grow coraline algae. Real live rock has anaerobic bacteria inside it that helps to eliminate nitrate buildup. There are also many small beneficial crustations and worms that come in with the rock as well as the micro and macro algaes.

It now seems according to Dr. Ron that live rock is a nutrient sink or heavy metal sponge and needs replacing about every 4-years. I agree with Rich that the Tampa cultured rock is not the best. Back 17-years ago Tampa rock was about all you saw. It had pretty sponges and tons of Christmas trees worm and other life from a deep low light environment. Pretty much everything on the rock slowly died and fertilized incredible hair algae blooms that lasted for a year or more. And you talk about stinking, I can still remember dreading having to put the Tampa Bay rock out.

 

[SPC]

Posted by Kalk:

Funny that its the lumber and food fish industies which are harming the reefs on these islands yet its coral collection that the Europeans are concerned about?

-No actually what they are concerned with is that Fiji follow the CITES recommendations and abide by the terms they have proposed.
Steve

 

[jamesw]

Did you guys check the date on this post? Sept 2000!!!!!!

Did fiji shut down exports then? Nope.

So let's not jump to conclusions here. This is s 2 year old post.

Cheers
James Wiseman

 

[dizzy]

There is certainly more current information out there than 2000. Earlier this year I read where CITES had recommended a cessation of trade with Yemen, Viet Nam, and Fiji. I also heard that Canada had agreed to stop allowing Fiji live rock and corals into the country. The later was from a marine wholesaler in Vancouver and posted on the AMDA forum. For what ever reason the United States has been very slow to follow the CITES recommendation. I think they gave Fiji a grace period to get their paper work in order, but rumors were that an unstable government was having trouble with compliance. I hope they get it resolved.

 

[esmithiii]

The date seems to be August 2002 to me. Am I missing something?

Ernie

 

[Basil63]

Did you guys check the date on this post? Sept 2000!!!!!!

Did fiji shut down exports then? Nope.

So let's not jump to conclusions here. This is s 2 year old post.

Cheers
James Wiseman

Learn to read. Sept 2000 is when they joined reefs.org. The post was 8/12/02.

As for a ban, We survived the ban on Hawian rock, and Florida rock, and we'll survive this too. There are other sources out there, that will eventually be exploited. Marshal islands come to mind, and I'm sure others will pop up in time.
Basil

 

[~sandman~]

Did you guys check the date on this post? Sept 2000!!!!!!

Did fiji shut down exports then? Nope.

So let's not jump to conclusions here. This is s 2 year old post.

Cheers
James Wiseman

Unless I'm missing something the date is 8/11/02. The member joined Sept. 2000

[/b]

 

[SPC]

Posted by dizzy:

I agree with Rich that the Tampa cultured rock is not the best. Back 17-years ago Tampa rock was about all you saw. It had pretty sponges and tons of Christmas trees worm and other life from a deep low light environment. Pretty much everything on the rock slowly died and fertilized incredible hair algae blooms that lasted for a year or more. And you talk about stinking, I can still remember dreading having to put the Tampa Bay rock out.

-That may have been the case 17 years ago dizzy but I can assure you it is not now. The rock that I get from TBS has very little die off with an incredible amount of life on it.
Steve

 

[dizzy]

-

That may have been the case 17 years ago dizzy but I can assure you it is not now. The rock that I get from TBS has very little die off with an incredible amount of life on it.
Steve

Steve one of the first things I noticed when I flew into Tampa was that the ocean was green not blue around there. I don't want to knock the guys doing the cultured rock there, but I would rather have cultured rock from shallow water in the Keys, or somewhere that more closely resembles the eco-system we are trying to recreate in our tanks. Perhaps the Tampa rock is better suited for FOWLR tanks.

 

[SPC]

Posted by dizzy:

Steve one of the first things I noticed when I flew into Tampa was that the ocean was green not blue around there. I don't want to knock the guys doing the cultured rock there, but I would rather have cultured rock from shallow water in the Keys, or somewhere that more closely resembles the eco-system we are trying to recreate in our tanks. Perhaps the Tampa rock is better suited for FOWLR tanks.

-I have TBS rock in my reef and it is doing just fine, in fact I have 5 different species of hard coral that are thriving which came in on this rock. I have seen alot of Fiji rock for sale and have yet to see any hard corals on it. Now if I was going by the green vs blue water theory I would expect just the opposite to be the case.
Steve

 

[jamesw]

You're right, I had the date wrong.

Same episode though - just happening again 6 months later. I'm willing to bet that there will be no interruption in the "flow" of liverock from Fiji. Anyone want to take that bet?

Cheers
James

 

[SPC]

This was a post in the Industry Forum about how L/R is collected in Fiji as seen by Bill2:

It is collect in even shallower water than mary stated. Most 3-4 ft. It is usually in very silty area and I have been told by the collectors the best stuff comes from areas near river mouths. I don't know why and I'm sure they could not explain it.

As probably most of you ahve noticed the rock usually has 2 sides... A brown one and the nice purple one we like. Well the purple side is usually buried in the silt/sand and the brown side is exposed to the sun. Everything that we like on the rock growns from incidental light that makes it through the couple inches of sand.

The collectors then throw (yes throw or maybe drop) the "dead ones" as they call em into rubbermaid buckets in the boat. At this point the rock is covered in algea of various sorts but usually sargassm and full of crabs, brittle stars, even some fish and loads of other stuff.

The boat then motors back to the shore where it is loaded onto a truck and taken back to the wherehouse. (sometimes the boat doesn't quite make it back as anticipated but that's another story)

At the wherehouse the rock goes through 2 stages before being readied to be shipped out. The first stage some guys pick off all the macro algea off it. Literally they sit on some buckets or a bench and pick off all the algea. At the end of the day they have a fairly substantial amount. After all the macro is pulled off they wash the rock to get all the silt off and out of all the cracks.

Once the rock is cleanded and readied it is usually stored in bins that have a spray bar constantly spraying on the live rock with water. The rock is then stored this way until shipping day. Usually a day or two

On packing day they load of they live rock boxes and it's surprising how exact they want to get. All those tiny pieces were put in the boxes specifically to get the weight up to 22 kilos. Sometimes on a rare ocassion they have break a piece of live rock to get it into a box so the pieces that seem to be broken off aren't they have just had a piece to be broken off them to fit. They do this because they are they are trying to fit as many live rock boxes in the airline containers and even a little bulging of the boxes can cause problems.

Then the rock is sent to wherever it is going.

Steve