The only way to have a positive effect is by increasing awareness.

I believe that home aquariums bring a piece of the ocean into our homes where we can teach our family and children the value of life and the benefits of preserving wildlife. Would each individual fish or critter be better off in their original environment,...of course. But bringing in animals responsibly, in proper numbers as not to deplete natural sources helps to make these animals 'real' for people. People can only form so much attachment watching things on TV or in pictures. Seeing it up close has I'm sure has engendered lots of support from new sources.

That is why the industry is regulated and monitored,...and cases like this get prosecuted.
I can't change everything and I am certainly no saint, but I'd like to think that if we all did just a little bit we could probably make things alot better.

Just thought I'd get my two cents in. I'm not saying what he did was right but some of you might want to look up what CITIES stands for. Convention for International Trade in Endangered Species. And yes permits are available for what he got caught for. I know because I work in the trade. The only thing that made it illegal was that he didn't have permits. The only difference is legal endangered species have a CITIES permit. None of these species are schedule I which cannot be imported. They are schedule II so they can be imported if done properly with a permit.

For those of you that would never keep an endangered species, you might want to take a second look at what you have in your tanks because any of you that have live rock(live rock is dead coral), coral, clams, seahorses are keeping endangered species. The only difference is yours hopefully had a little piece of paper that said its OK. And you thought you were that much better than him. Do any of you have copies of the CITIES permits to prove your stuff is legal if customs or DFO came knocking on your door? I can prove some of mine is legal because I have some of the permit numbers on file for some of my coral but not all. You might want to take a look in the mirror and reconsider your thoughts because most of us guilty of keeping endangered species.

Thats all I have to say and I'm not saying anymore.

well put thank you for clearing that up:)

So we require permits for keeping these things in tanks? Or are the permits just for importing?

good points, and true....but they still don't diminish the reason for this post. And to correct myself, I should have used the term banned species rather than endangered but again only semantics. No one has convicted me of smuggling with or without permits.

If I see everyone stealing around me, do I say nothing?

Regardless, my original point still stands. It's one thing to be involved in a hobby with questionable practices,...totally different to openly support someone convicted of crimes.

And I know quite well I am not perfect,...does a person have to be perfect themselves before they are allowed to speak out against something they consider wrong? It's like the other guy taking shots because I have less posts than him, like either one makes any difference?!?

Anyways, I'd like to thank everyone for their participation and contributions. You have turned what was intended to be a small post on a local relevant topic into a huge discussion and brought it lots of attention. :x-mas:

The permits are only required for international trade(import/export/re-export). I'm only saying that once these items enter the country we can only assume they were legally imported unless you have access to the permits for proof. If you were trying to re-export from Canada to another country or from the US to Canada, you would need copies of the original CITIES permit from the country of origin. The reason most cultured corals from the US (like some ORA)cannot be legally re-exported into Canada is because they do not have a copy of the original permit of origin.

But how could anyone know if a coral originated in the ocean or from a frag of a frag of a frag?

if its in your tank in this country its assumed permits were had to bring it in making it legal for you to have, its getting caught in the process of importing without having the proper documents thats illegal.....anyone could have black market animals in there tank theres no way to tell.

which is exactly why we should be getting rid of the ones we do catch.

And just to clarify, by getting rid of, I mean to say get them out of the industry,..I'm not suggesting Myka get the AK out.:twised:

Thats the problem you can't and either can they. The way customs sees it they all originated from the ocean at one time. Any piece of calcium carbonate based coral skeleton is considered to be part of an endangerded species whether captive grown or wild. They cannot tell the difference between a third generation frag containing none of the original coral or a clipping of a wild coral. Canada and the US as well as other countries do not allow export of there own corals so that coral had to come from somewhere. The only way to kind of prove that coral is legal is with a copy of the permit. But who is to say a certain permit goes with a certain coral. I guess a permit containing Acropora could really be used for any re-export of an acropora. Who would know?