How come?

1

11jadaway

Well-Known Member
This is my list of how comes:
1. How come whale sharks are in captivity yet their smaller cousins basking sharks aren't?
2. How come Indo-Chinese Tigers aren't in many zoos yet Sumatran Tigers (the rarest) seem to be in captivity more?
3. How come bengal tigers are so well known but siberian isn't as much?
4. How come babirusa aren't kept in many zoos?
Please answer these questions.
 
I'll have a go - but these are my opinions, not necessarily gospel truth. Other members may be able to give more authoritative answers.
  1. whale sharks are more spectacular
  2. the zoos with good breeding records have concentrated on the rarer subspecies, both Sumatran and Siberian - other subspecies have been interbred and/or died out
  3. I don't agree, Bengal tigers are well known in India, but rare in captivity now (see previous answer)
  4. very few babirusa have been imported, so many zoo specimens are inbred and breeding success has been poor in recent years

Alan
 
1: A major issue for the basking shark is that it is a subtropical/temperate species. When they visit warmer regions, they tend to stay quite deep, i.e. even there they stay in fairly cold water. Since large oceanic tanks almost always are warm-water (typically kept at 23-24 Celsius/74-75 Fahrenheit), basking sharks wouldn't thrive long term. If an aquarium kept a huge tank at suitable temperatures, they might be able to keep basking sharks, but relatively few other species typically kept in such ocean tanks could be kept because they require tropical temperatures. Additionally, it is more expensive to run water chillers than water heaters. The price for chilling a tank with several million litres/gallons during the summer would be huge.

This can, to some extent, be compared to the blue shark. While its strongly pelagic behavior undoubtedly plays a role (=fin abrasion when colliding with aquarium walls), I suspect temperature is another big factor that has prevented success in keeping this species despite several attempts in warm-water tanks.

What's currently the largest tank for fish (not whales) kept at fairly cold temperatures? I think the 4.5 million litre/1.2 million gallon ocean tank at Nordsøen Oceanarium in Denmark may be the largest or did I forget about something? This tank is kept at 8-17 Celsius/46-62 Fahrenheit, following the temperature fluctuations in the North Sea and almost exactly the optimum range for blue and basking sharks. Though you might be able to keep basking sharks in a tank of that size, you'd probably need one that was at least 1.5x larger for it to have a reasonable chance of success.
 
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Because the Indochinese Tigers in the United states were reclassified as Malayan Tigers.

Also very few pure Royal Bengal Tigers exist anywhere outside India even in reputable breeding programs. Much like so called reticulated giraffes in America zoos are mostly generic so are most bengal tigers.
 
condor said:
This can, to some extent, be compared to the blue shark. While its strongly pelagic behavior undoubtedly plays a role (=fin abrasion when colliding with aquarium walls), I suspect temperature is another big factor that has prevented success in keeping this species despite several attempts in warm-water tanks.

What's currently the largest tank for fish (not whales) kept at fairly cold temperatures? I think the 4.5 million litre/1.2 million gallon ocean tank at Nordsøen Oceanarium in Denmark may be the largest or did I forget about something? This tank is kept at 8-17 Celsius/46-62 Fahrenheit, following the temperature fluctuations in the North Sea and almost exactly the optimum range for blue and basking sharks. Though you might be able to keep basking sharks in a tank of that size, you'd probably need one that was at least 1.5x larger for it to have a reasonable chance of success.
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Has anybody ever successfully kept blue sharks in captivity condor? I looked at the Nordsoen Oceanarium website and couldn't find any mention of what sharks they keep in the large open ocean tank.
 
DavidBrown said:
Has anybody ever successfully kept blue sharks in captivity condor? I looked at the Nordsoen Oceanarium website and couldn't find any mention of what sharks they keep in the large open ocean tank.
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Adventure Aquarium used to have Blue Sharks. I recall seeing them in the 760,000 gallon Open Ocean Tank in 1993. They faired pretty well, as they were known to have success with them due to the size of the exhibit.
 
How come seemingly popular animals such as Bush Dogs and Japanese Raccoon Dogs aren't represented very well in the U.S.?

How come we don't import Platypus from Australia?

How come we don't import more pure Bengal Tigers from India?
 
ThylacineAlive said:
How come seemingly popular animals such as Bush Dogs and Japanese Raccoon Dogs aren't represented very well in the U.S.?

How come we don't import Platypus from Australia?

How come we don't import more pure Bengal Tigers from India?
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I'm pretty sure that there have been multiple threads explaining why platypus can't be imported. (Don't ask me what they are, I just remember reading them)

Bengal tigers aren't as endangered as Amur, Malayan, and Sumatran tigers, so why would zoos want to replace their critically endangered species with one that isn't as rare.
 
arcticwolf said:
I'm pretty sure that there have been multiple threads explaining why platypus can't be imported. (Don't ask me what they are, I just remember reading them)

Bengal tigers aren't as endangered as Amur, Malayan, and Sumatran tigers, so why would zoos want to replace their critically endangered species with one that isn't as rare.
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Bengals (well Bengal hybrids) are still a very popular animal that's displayed in several zoos like Cincinnati and Buffalo so I think that instead of continuing to breed and conserve a hybrid, we should start focusing on importing a few pure breeds so we can make a purer population of a popular zoo animal.

On the 'What can America do to get Australia to give us a Platypus?' thread, it was discused that all that had to be done to get a Platypus into the U.S. is simply ask.
 
ThylacineAlive said:
On the 'What can America do to get Australia to give us a Platypus?' thread, it was discused that all that had to be done to get a Platypus into the U.S. is simply ask.
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That was a joke that I made.

The barrier in getting a platypus is that the Australian government doesn't want them to leave the country. Some here have speculated that this may be because platypi don't reproduce very often in captivity and probably only captive bred individuals would be allowed to be sent abroad, as is the case with koalas.
 
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ThylacineAlive said:
How come seemingly popular animals such as Bush Dogs and Japanese Raccoon Dogs aren't represented very well in the U.S.?

How come we don't import Platypus from Australia?

How come we don't import more pure Bengal Tigers from India?
Click to expand...

DavidBrown said it perfectly regarding the platypus situation.
India has a pretty good breeding system with pure Bengal Tigers already, and there is no need to export them outside of the country. We already have 3 Tiger SSP's going on, so we don't need to make room for another with an already sustainable program going on in India.
 
Ok, the Tiger and Platypus things make sense.

How come we don't have a species survival plan for cetaceans?
 
Gulo gulo said:
Adventure Aquarium used to have Blue Sharks. I recall seeing them in the 760,000 gallon Open Ocean Tank in 1993. They faired pretty well, as they were known to have success with them due to the size of the exhibit.
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As far as I know, the following are the only that have tried to keep blue: Valencia, Lisbon, Okinawa, Sea World San Diego, Marineland of the Pacific (now closed), Monterey Bay and Adventure Aquarium. This includes open ocean tanks that are far larger than the one at Adventure Aquarium. As elsewhere, the blue at Adventure Aquarium frequently swam along the walls and had difficulties pulling away once it was near, leading to abrasions (same with mako). All tanks that have been tried were essentially tropical, though Sea World San Diego and Monterey Bay were borderline subtropical at about 20 C/68 F, near the upper limit of the preferred temperature of blue shark (in Sea World they later turned the temperature up and introduced bull, which then predated the blue). At 7 months, Adventure Aquarium has the survival record, followed by 3 months at Monterey Bay. Hardly a real success for a shark with an estimated longevity of 20 years in the wild and several other similar-sized, less oceanic, warm-water shark species easily surpass 10 years in captivity.

DavidBrown said:
I looked at the Nordsoen Oceanarium website and couldn't find any mention of what sharks they keep in the large open ocean tank.
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The only sharks are fairly small species: spiny dogfish, small-spotted catshark, starry smoothhound and tope shark. For many years they've wanted to get porbeagles, but sourcing them has proven very difficult. The entire aquarium is aimed at local species and they get most from local fishermen. This was the plan for the porbeagle too, but very few are caught (only recreational fishers are allowed to deliberately fish for this species) and they're usually dead well before the boat approaches land. If they ever succeed, it would be first in the world. However, I won't hold my breath for that.
 
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