>>Yea, aquariums are now living peices of furniture, and the goal is to ahve
one thats as pretty as possible. Fish aren't pets, they're just displayed.
<<
I'm not sure it's a devolution, nor has the core reason for keeping fish
changed. Who didn't start keeping fish because they were pretty and they
liked to look-in-their "display"? I know a couple researchers in our Pharmacy
Dept who keep zebra danios because they're easy to breed, aren't mammals (and
thus less regulated), and that's about the only reason they keep fish (kinda
systematic and disgusting too lol). But otherwise, anyone else who keeps fish
is initially guilty (if there really is an implicit guilt) of keeping fish for
the sole reason of "pretty".
So all I was saying is that far less people are interested in maintaing the
females of the species they choose to keep than in the past. This has an
effect on the market, and what you as a consumer will see-in-the market.
Perhaps I presented an assumed perspective that I felt a curio cabinent was
something degenerate?
I mean this is precisely the reason why I'm currently sitting next to a 75
gallon with male rainbowfish (females get harrassed to death), barbs, botia,
pearl gouramies and sterbai cory cats :) What the barbs and cory cats breed
off, the loaches eat, even though I _could_ find a market for the sterbai.
Same reason I keep madtoms in every native tank I have. I don't want babies.
I want pretty.
Now if I learn something in the meantime, and can teach others what I've
learned, well, all the better. Just got a little more mileage out of my
selfish act. Making any statement or judgement beyond that gets elitist
really fast, and I'm not sure the elitism has much of a foundation to stand
on, since we're ALL doing it for the same basic reason, regardless of how
we've currently rationalized our mania :)
Todd
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