Males only tank!

[newhobbist]

Is there anything wrong about keeping fish only to be able to enjoy a view of the tank full of beautiful fish moving around? Very ofter female fish is not as colorful as males. Also, very often it is recommended to keep one male per several females to prevent aggression. That will lead to having 4-5 colorful fish in the tank and 10-15 plain looking fish.
I understand that having both sexes is a natural way of keeping fish and we all are so worried about them feeling as if they were in their natural habitat. And, when I told a friend of my that I'm keeping males only (with an exception of a pair of Mollies), I suddenly became an enemy of all living creatures! Not trying to sound cynical, if we were so interested in well-being of fish, we would not buy fish in the first place. For every nice little pet we have in our glass houses, how many of them died when being caught, on the way to our LFSs, and in LFSs? Some would argue that some species exist only in hobbists' tanks and would be extinct otherwise. But, the main reason (with some exceptions) for extinction of species is that they are being caught in huge numbers to satisfy our "wants", not "needs".
In conclusion, I will openly state that I buy fish based on their look and behavior. If I decide to breed fish either commercially, or just to see "how fish does it", I will buy females. Otherwise, for species with males looking much better than females, I will buy only males no matter how bad someone thinks of me!!!

 

[greenmaji]

Im sorry someone upset you about this.
But.. I find it almost funny that its considered a big issue for some reason..
How is a all males tank a crime against nature? I personally dont know.. Maybe there would be less aggression, but.. IME most of the fish Ive kept were not sexually dimorphic.. in other words.. I had no clue and most likely they were many instances the fish were either all male or female and I never could tell the difference when raising them, good or bad aggression wise. Sure there might be some instances where aggresion is a factor, but I havnt experinced it personaly to the best of my knologe. I really dont think aggression is much of a problem with guppies or rasbora's for instance even if there all male, not IME anyway.
And the argument about economics not supporting populations is well.. an oppinion.. do you think there would be near as many cattle on this earth if we didnt consume them? I think not.. Not to mention, most all FW fish are captively bred for the sole purpose of sale in the pet market, that would not have existed if not for that market to consume the fish. I might be a bit economically biased since I majored in economics but to say that consumption creates nothing is a little far fetched to me (example: buffalo burgers to save the buffalo)
collecting anemonies in the wild, that clown fish need in order to bred, into captivity for the hobbie to the point of considerbly impacting both species natrual numbers I can see an argument against (and am agianst that myself). so the argument isnt totaly lost on me..

 

[BrianNY]

I think I understand the jist. There's a huge difference between between commercially spawned species such as angels or discus or say stripping otos from their natural habitat. It does raise an ethical question.

 

[newhobbist]

It's not about being ethical or not, but about consistency. If someone buys wild-caught fish, possibly endangering existing these species in the wild, they should not claim to be better than others only because they keep pairs. Sometimes it sounds like "I will create a natural habitat for this fish no matter how many of these fish dies before I reach my goal".
When I buy fish, I don't really know if the fish was wild-caught or farm-rased. If I know, I would not prefer wild-caught fish, but fish I like (appearance + behavior). And, I won't buy fish if it is sold as wild-caught rare fish.
I really like this forum were people who like this hobby help each other. That's, probably, why I posted this topic. It's good to love your hobby like you do, but some (I'm talking about that friend of mine, who probably never visits such forums anyway) loves fish in his tank more than everything on the other side of the glass. I'm really worried about him :?

 

[Lakota]

Ya know your right. And, ya know what, I've done something about it(or am in the process of it) I am making, or breeding colorful female guppies. They are beautiful. They have black bodies, purple bodies, blue bodies, pastel bodies, and cobra bodies. I'm sure I have more, can't think of them now. But, you are right, female fish out there are too plain and I think we all need to do something about that
But, in all seriousness, try what I tried. Try to breed your females to where they are pretty. I hated my plain grey female guppies, and ya know what, I did something about it and they are beautiful.
Oh and by the way, my fish(with the execption of a three in the beginning) were not taken from the wild they were either bred by me or bred by friends. So, sorry to say that not everyone doesn't have the fishes best interest in heart because of all the ones that died during them being caught. Anyways, do something about the females not looking good, don't harp about it.

Just ranting, sorry
Lakota

 

[chrism]

My take on all of this is...

Yes we all love fish, we all want them to be happy, but we want something pretty to look at which is why we spend countless hours elbow deep in water creating stunning aquascapes etc.

It's not a selfless hobby, keeping any animal in captivity is not for it's best interests (apart from protecting species from being hunted to extinction) a dog, is a wild animal a dog would never be found sitting when it was told to in nature, i believe it would be in a pack. Rabbits... oh yea they like living in solitude in a small cage... Nobody can mimick nature in captivity, we can do our best, wpc, lighting scheduals, plants, even creating biotypes... but it's not wild, and its not nature and it's not natural...

in conclusion, i don't think there is anything wrong with keeping all males lol and if you like it, and it's not cruel, whats the problem?

the only fish i know of that i have that is female is my BN... and i would have rathered a male lol cos she's not bristley!