SAVING THE RAINFOREST, ONE PET FISH AT A TIME

DESPITE THE OBJECTIONS OF ANIMAL PROTECTION ORGANIZATIONS, CAREFUL COMMERCIAL FISHING MAY BE THE BEST BET FOR THE AMAZON AND THE WORLD’S AQUARIUMS.

- FABIAN FEDERL

“CROCODILE!” CÉLIA CASTRO Pinheiro calls back to her husband as she steps into knee-deep water of the Rio Negro, a tea-colored river that begins in the Colombian mountains and flows into the Amazon below the Brazilian city of Manaus. Castro Pinheiro wades cautiously ahead, holding a machete high, worried less about carnivorous beasts and more about the condition of her fish trap, known as a fyke.

When she reaches the bag net structure, about 4 by 2 meters in size, she sees the wooden struts are broken and the net torn to shreds. This is bad news: Thousands of fish, several days’ catch, have either escaped or been eaten by the crocodile.

“It was a young one,” Castro Pinheiro says of the creature, with surprising composure, “no more than two meters long.” Her husband, Jel Pereira da Silva, crouches on the riverbank, resting his rifle on his knees. “It’s somewhere around here,” he says, tapping his rifle. “Either we dismantle the trap and find another place or I’ll stay here tonight, until the crocodile comes out of hiding.”

The couple live in the state of Amazonas in northwestern Brazil, and their livelihood is threatened by more than hungry reptiles. Every day in the Rio Negro, they catch and sell fish that are later displayed in aquariums from New York to Berlin to Tokyo. According to estimates from Jens Crueger, president of the Association of the German Aquarium and Terrarium Associations, more than 100 million aquariums are maintained in living rooms around the world. By sheer numbers kept, ornamental fish are the world’s most popular pets. The ornamental fish trade is estimated by the World Wildlife Fund to have a retail value of over $15 billion annually.