[OceanicCorals-Ian-]

The fishermen/women go out and collect the fish/corals. This is usually done over a period of a couple of days to about a week; depending on the type of fish/corals the fishermen/women are after and how far away they mush travel by boat.

Once collected the fish are placed in holding tanks that is fed with fresh seawater or they are kept in holding tanks that is being water changed all the time.

The collectors bring the livestock to exporters that they work for and the fish/corals are then placed in holding systems at the warehouse awaiting export. This process could take days or a week depending on the exporter's customers' demand. The fish are generally not fed at this point while awaiting export because the exporters don't want the fish to mess in the bag and die from ammonia poisoning.

Once an order has been placed by the international importer, the fish are bagged with seawater and oxygen and are packaged usually a few hours to a day prior to shipping. For a typical Indonesian fish/coral shipment; the livestock generally are in the bags for about 22-30 hours before arriving to Vancouver.

Indonesia to Vancouver is usually a direct flight and 90% of the time; the water in the bags are still warm.

It is also worth mentioning that as the fish are traveling in the bags, the PH levels of the water is decreased rendering the ammonia that is released by the fish's waste to be not harmful.

However, when the importer receives the fish; care must be taken that when fresh oxygen is reintroduced to the water by way of releasing the fish into a acclimating bucket; they must neutralize the ammonia and slowly increase the PH levels to that of the holding tanks. If this is not done or is done too quickly; the fish will get stressed out and this is when pathogens that the fish are usually immune to are able to take a foot hold and attack the stressed fish.

Acclimatization of livestock usually takes over a course of 4-6 hours depending on the type of livestock that is being received.

The mortality rate of the livestock is very dependent on how the fish is collected from the fishermen to how they were stored on the boat to the condition of the exporters warehouse and how long they were kept there waiting for export. Then it comes down to the receiving of the livestock and the care of their acclimatization process.

HTH.

Ian.