phhhhhhhhhhhh phhhhhhhhhhhhhh, that's me
blowing the dust off my blog. It's not that I've been entirely lazy. I'm
'writing' book two which mostly involves banging my head against my desk, but
either way it's left my blog a little dusty.
I've returned to share a tale about the most
romantic fish in the sea and the people who are helping to save this species from
extinction because it's dangerously close. In fact, the seahorse is now listed
by CITES as an endangered species and is on the brink of extinction.
Those people are the couple who passionately
started Ocean Rider Seahorse farm in Kona, Hawai'i in 1998. I recently visited
their seahorse farm to see radical conservation in action and left inspired by
their conservation success story.
Up until recently, approximately 1,000,000
wild seahorses annually were taken from the sea for the pet store trade. That
number has been dramatically reduced as people are now buying sustainable
seahorses from Ocean Rider.
Seahorses are incredibly romantic - and
monogamous. Once they choose a partner, they are together for life, as in never
out of sight from one another. The male carries the babies and out of the 1000
or so he delivers, maybe one will survive, making this species ability to
survive human consumption precarious at best.
On average, a wild seahorse will survive in a
home aquarium for two weeks. Why such a short life span, when in the wild they
can live for 20+ years? Because unlike humans, who reach for the nearest tub of
Ben and Jerry's when heartbroken, seahorses starve themselves to death without
their soul mate.
Seahorses born and raised at Ocean Rider seahorse
farm grow up surrounded by many other seahorses and are adaptable to meeting
new friends. These farmed seahorses can
live for a long time in an aquarium; in fact, some of their original horses
from 1998 are still alive today in their respective new homes.
Not only does Ocean Rider keep wild seahorses
in the ocean, they also help protect our fragile oceans and coral reefs from
keeping the demand out of the sea.
Seahorses are also used in TCM (Traditional
Chinese Medicine) and sadly, 50% of the wild seahorse population disappeared
from 1990 - 1995. If you just felt your heart break a little, you're not alone.
The bright side though is there are people making a BIG positive impact, people
like Ocean Rider. If you're in Kona, pay them a visit; you'll even get to hold
a seahorse. This model can be used for many species to help protect the wild
population - lots of opportunity for entrepreneurs to make a positive
impact.
From the Ocean Rider website:
Our story has
now become a model as to the difference a few people, a good idea, and a small
aqua-farm can make in protecting and reducing the pressure on our coral
reefs and sea grass beds. The technology developed here for the
culture of seahorses is transferrable to the culture of other exotic
marine fish from the coral reefs to the deep sea paving a way to greatly
reduce the amount of wild fish taken out of our ocean. It is
our belief that we can bring our oceans back to the level of health and
productivity seen at the turn of the century by using this technology combined
with conservation solutions that are available to us all.
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