Ripples (Store) Bad Source Of Fish?

.... Cpds are all farm bred as they are now virtually extinct in the wild....

Word of the CPDs discovery spread like wildfire around the world, and their popularity was enhanced by the Internet. Early in 2007, just a couple of months after word of their discovery took the hobby by storm, rumors of their demise also spread around the Internet. Rumor had it that the pool where all of the CPDs were being collected had been completely emptied of fish. International environmental organizations were lobbying governments around the world to have all trading in the CPD halted immediately. All of this happened on the Internet.

You could just hear the enemies of the aquarium hobby salivating and getting ready to jump on us. (Yes, there are enemies of the aquarium hobby out there, and they are just waiting for one screw-up on our part to attack us and prove all of their twisted innuendos as correct.) News organizations were already jumping on this rumor, blaming hobbyists for the demise of this newly described species within just a few months of its discovery.

This was the first time that the hobby would have been directly linked to the demise of a species, although it is often falsely blamed for such things. In fact, research has found that all of the fish taken for the hobby don’t make a measurable dent in wild populations. Collecting benefits local people, the habitat, and the fish being collected. Locals want to keep the fish populations strong so they have a source of income for years to come. But a lot of folks never let the facts get in the way of a good rumor, and the demise of the CPD was a goodrumor. I even fell for it myself.

However, there was something very wrong if this rumor were in fact true. Normally when something becomes scarce the price of the ones remaining goes up. However, in this case the wholesale price of the CPD did exactly the opposite; it went down considerably over a very short period of time not long after the stories of the demise of the fish began circulating.

To paraphrase Mark Twain, the rumors of the CPD’s death has been greatly exaggerated. Instead just being found in the one pond reported as drying up, it appears these fish are actually in a fairly widespread series of pools and ponds. Currently, scientists and even collectors are unsure of the extent of their range. What is clear is that the CPD is not “endangered” or “extinct.” Those words mean specific things, and should not be bandied about without a lot of research to back them up. Don’t believe everything you read on the Internet! Using standard collecting techniques and returning the plants to the ponds after collecting, along with rotating the ponds where they are harvested and farm breeding, should ensure the viability of these beauties for generations to come.

Those reporting the fish’s demise also did not take into account the incredible fecundity of these diminutive beauties. Since the adults spawn almost every day, and since the newly hatched fry head to the bottom for several days, a pond could be completely cleaned out of adults and be restocked with a breeding population in just a couple of months. Plus, the species has proven extremely easy to breed and prolific in the tanks of aquarists. If they haven’t already done so, it won’t be long before the fish farmers begin to work with this species. Since the CPD is so easy to spawn, fish farms should be able to produce them by the tens of thousands.