Hawaii Ban -Whats the price of a Yellow Tang in your area now?

[DibsOnMcRibs]

Went to two LFS in the Bay Area today:
Half dollar sized yellow tangs were 250-300 at each place. Kole tangs were 150-180.

 

[RobB'z Reef]

Wait, we need Alaska for fish food.

Yeah I love cod and king crab!

 

[RobB'z Reef]

Went to two LFS in the Bay Area today:
Half dollar sized yellow tangs were 250-300 at each place. Kole tangs were 150-180.

I got 3" one for 200 in the mpls area couple days ago.

 

[KrisReef]

Yes, they are still available and will be more available now that the price favors the poaching market.

Florida - Hawaiian Yellow Tangs Available

I've got a couple of Hawaiian Yellow Tangs (silver dollar pancake sized) available if anyone is interested. $500 for both. If you're on the east coast of Florida between Daytona and Ft. Lauderdale I'll deliver them. If you need them shipped, I'll calculate shipping cost for you.

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Nano man]

Glad I got a potters wrasse last week for only 90 bucks then. I would have bought one at any other time for that price anyways, but after the ban I was all to happy to buy it.

Hey Man where in the world were you able to find a Potters wrasse? I have been trying to get one for a year!

 

[KrisReef]

The good old days are gone.
2014 Yellow tang under $20.

 

[TangGang]

Hey Man where in the world were you able to find a Potters wrasse? I have been trying to get one for a year!

Local fish store (seaside tropical fish in California) had one. He was eating mysis about 5 mins after being put into qt, and now is happily swimming around the dt

 

[DrPterois]

pues aca en algunos locales en México Ciudad, hasta en $7000 pesos mexicanos, unos 300 usd.

 

[Intheflesh]

2 weeks ago there was a yellow tang at my LFS for $50-60. My QT tank wasn't quite ready, and had the intention of going back that weekend to buy it. But alas it was gone already

 

[robbyg]

The good old days are gone.
2014 Yellow tang under $20.

Nah I doubt it. The fact that Yellow Tangs are so abundant in the water means that they breed very quickly. I suspect in 3-5 years they will be so abundant in Hawai that they will open up the Trade again. That is of course dependant on the market as by then Yellow tang aquaculture may be as common as clown fish and no one will even care for wild caught YT again.

 

[shred5]

Nah I doubt it. The fact that Yellow Tangs are so abundant in the water means that they breed very quickly. I suspect in 3-5 years they will be so abundant in Hawai that they will open up the Trade again. That is of course dependant on the market as by then Yellow tang aquaculture may be as common as clown fish and no one will even care for wild caught YT again.

Yellow tangs are far far harder to breed than clownfish. They do not even eat the same foods in larval stage.
I also doubt Hawaii will open because there is not a shortage of yellow tangs. It also was not just yellow tangs it was all fish. Hawaii is usually the first to shut and has always been so expect other to follow. Hawaii was the first to ban live rock collecting than came Caribbean/Florida. Been rumors for a while Florida is thinking of banning fish or reducing collecting. The difference numbers are dropping in the area due to lion fish.

Flame wrasse and Yellow tang were on stock list for my 100g, RIP my dreams...
Anyone ever seen Flame Wrasse captive bred?

I have not seen anyone who has ever successfully bred a wrasse.




I just do not think people understand breeding most saltwater fish is not like breeding freshwater or even clownfish and allot of these fish will sadly never be a common in the hobby at least not for a very very long time.

 

[Jbell370]

Here they are s-$150 m-$200 l-$250. That is in CDN, my local guy had a restock come in and every yellow, purple and Kole is gone.

 

[Roger D]

Kansas city they're $279 they had three.

 

[robbyg]

Yellow tangs are far far harder to breed than clownfish. They do not even eat the same foods in larval stage.
I also doubt Hawaii will open because there is not a shortage of yellow tangs. It also was not just yellow tangs it was all fish. Hawaii is usually the first to shut and has always been so expect other to follow. Hawaii was the first to ban live rock collecting than came Caribbean/Florida. Been rumors for a while Florida is thinking of banning fish or reducing collecting. The difference numbers are dropping in the area due to lion fish.

It's no longer a secret, people know how to breed them! These high prices are incentive enough for more companies to start joining in and the existing ones to expand. If your a proven breeder like Biota it's not to hard to go to the bank right now and say you want a loan to Quadruple your capacity. On paper its easy to prove that the prices and demand for your product have gone up by four fold. This is not difficult to work out, this is just pure capitalism doing what it always does.

I have not seen anyone who has ever successfully bred a wrasse.




I just do not think people understand breeding most saltwater fish is not like breeding freshwater or even clownfish and allot of these fish will sadly never be a common in the hobby at least not for a very very long time.

Your basing your projections on the state of affairs as they existed before. Its a heck of a lot easier to get fish out of the Ocean than to breed them, but once the Ocean option starts to disappear the time period for your projection shrink rapidly!
Money is one hell of an incentive.

 

[vetteguy53081]

three stores in my area dont even have yellow tangs

 

[Scape]

£60 or $83

 

[shred5]

It's no longer a secret, people know how to breed them! These high prices are incentive enough for more companies to start joining in and the existing ones to expand. If your a proven breeder like Biota it's not to hard to go to the bank right now and say you want a loan to Quadruple your capacity. On paper its easy to prove that the prices and demand for your product have gone up by four fold. This is not difficult to work out, this is just pure capitalism doing what it always does.



Your basing your projections on the state of affairs as they existed before. Its a heck of a lot easier to get fish out of the Ocean than to breed them, but once the Ocean option starts to disappear the time period for your projection shrink rapidly!
Money is one hell of an incentive.

Actually it is still a secret as I have stated before those who breed are not sharing. I understand why they keep the secrets but it is bad for the hobby. Also Biota already has said these are seasonal. You can get two clutches of clownfish a month.

You really think it is easy to set up a breeding facility? Why do you think there are so many in third world countries. It is the cost of being near seawater. Think of what the property cost are to be near a ocean in warm climates in this country. Save a fortune by using ocean water and it also gives the opportunity to collect food since the type of food used to raise these fish is hard to raise in quantity. Another issue with some of these island nations is they can shut you down at any time. It could even happen in Hawaii. Hawaii could pass a bill that says hey Biota we can not tell the difference between poached wild and your yellow tangs and no longer allowed to be exported out of the state. Highly unlikely but it could happen. These people that are against the hobby have allot of money. This was not about collecting fish from the ocean it was political and against the hobby in general.

This was not just yellow tangs it is allot of fish. Wrasses which can not be bred. This is not stuff that happens over night either, we just do not know how to breed them. Anyone who follows fish breeding knows this.
Look at wrasses prices. Some fish just require massive spaces and broadcast spawn. Will we be able to breed more fish sure we will, it will always get better but it is not happening fast. How do you make up for probably half a million fish from one place, the size of the facility would be massive. Now you have the costs of fish going up and forcing people to leave the hobby because of cost. You also have less coming into the hobby because of cost. Now you have a shrinking hobby. Some may not want to invest.

I mean the food alone is very hard to raise. Most fish will not survive on rotifers or BBS. The food is harder to raise than it is to breed most saltwater fish. They have a long larval stage in which they are extremely delicate till metamorphoses. Saltwater fish have a larval stage in which they drift with the plankton where freshwater fish are fry.

Anyone that has tried to breed saltwater fish knows the difficulty in just bringing up the food. Most fish are not like clowns fish and have regular breeding cycles and breed on a medium.

I am done with this subject because it does not seem to pay to talk to people about breeding fish. Just let me say it is not like the freshwater hobby and it is not like propagating coral.

 

[Rubberfrog]

Actually it is still a secret as I have stated before those who breed are not sharing. I understand why they keep the secrets but it is bad for the hobby. Also Biota already has said these are seasonal. You can get two clutches of clownfish a month.

You really think it is easy to set up a breeding facility? Why do you think there are so many in third world countries. It is the cost of being near seawater. Think of what the property cost are to be near a ocean in warm climates in this country. Save a fortune by using ocean water and it also gives the opportunity to collect food since the type of food used to raise these fish is hard. Another issue with some of these island nations is they can shut you down at any time. It could even happen in Hawaii. Hawaii could pass a bill that says hey Biota we can not tell the difference between poached wild and your yellow tangs and no longer allowed to be exported out of the state. Highly unlikely but it could happen. These people that are against the hobby have allot of money. This was not about collecting fish from the ocean it was political and against the hobby in general.

This was not just yellow tangs it is allot of fish. Wrasses which can not be bred. This is not stuff that happens over night either, we just do not know how to breed them. Anyone who follows fish breeding knows this.
Look at wrasses prices. Some fish just require massive spaces and broadcast spawn. Will we be able to breed more fish sure we will, it will always get better but it is not happening fast. How do you make up for probably half a million fish from one place the size of the facility would be massive. Now you have the costs of fish going up and forcing people to leave the hobby because of cost. You also have less coming into the hobby because of cost. Now you have a shrinking hobby. Some may not want to invest.

I mean the food alone is very hard to raise. Most fish will not survive on rotifers or BBS. The food is harder to raise than it is to breed most saltwater fish. They have a long larval stage in which they are extremely delicate till metamorphoses. Saltwater fish have a larval stage in which they drift with the plankton where freshwater fish are fry.

Anyone that has tried to breed saltwater fish knows the difficulty in just bringing up the food. Most fish are not like clowns fish and have regular breeding cycles and breed on a medium.

I am done with this subject because it does not seem to pay to talk to people about breeding fish. Just let me say it is not like the freshwater hobby and it is not like propagating coral.

Some folks don't want to know what they don't know. Breeding tangs is neither cheap, nor easy. Clowns breed in a 20 gallon tank. Tangs breed in tanks the size of a refinery.

 

[2Wheelsonly]

So wasn't it recently announced that this was actually a temporary ban as they further regulate the trade? I was reading that prices should eventually recover within the next 2 years.

 

[shred5]

So wasn't it recently announced that this was actually a temporary ban as they further regulate the trade? I was reading that prices should eventually recover within the next 2 years.

Some are interpreting it that way but from most in the industry say it wont happen. Kind of like when someone says they are for something but they really are not but know it wont happen anyway. It was closed till a study but most think at this point the study wont happen and the last study was rejected so why spend the money anyway. Studies have shown no population decreases already. This is political by some with deep pockets lobbying. The Reef hobby is made out to be the villain. If we do not get our act together it will get bad.

They have been trying to shut it down for so long and it finally happened. Even if it opened it would close soon. Most have lost the fight. The real problem is money and where does it come from to fight this or get a study done.

I mean who knows though it is allot of speculation out there and maybe the money will be there. Even if the study is done does not mean they will accept it or have another excuse.

Some folks don't want to know what they don't know. Breeding tangs is neither cheap, nor easy. Clowns breed in a 20 gallon tank. Tangs breed in tanks the size of a refinery.

It is basically some just do not understand because they do not know anything about it.
Allot look at the freshwater hobby and think we can be like it. In the freshwater hobby most can actually breed most of the fish at home. Well with saltwater other than a handful we can not but people see all these clowns and think the rest are the same. Most of the food to feed larval fish is harder to raise than breeding most freshwater fish. I think I was like 9 when I bred my first freshwater fish and we are not talking live breeders' this was from egg.
They are just uneducated in breeding so they just do not know.

We have came a long way in breeding. I mean tangs have been bred and enough to actually sell. Still such a long way to go though and most of the fish in the hobby have not even been bred ever. There will be more fish bred and in larger quantities for sure but it wont happen overnight and we are looking at years probably for just a handful more. I mean you first have to breed successfully and then be able to get it up into enough quantity to even sell.

The other thing is when I got into breeding saltwater fish back in the day people shared information now it is all trade secrets. The thing is with saltwater fish is it is not like coral and most of the fish wont be bred in the home. There are so few places with the capabilities to do this kind of thing. With most of the fish they will have a lock on those fish and be able to set their own prices. This hobby in the future if more shut downs or more restrictions happen may end up being a lot more expensive.