I can't believe they sell LIVE FISH on eBay!!

blaise802001

stevew8975 wrote: »

How do you think most of these Koi come into Britain in the first place? They don't swim here!

I've bought a few Koi recently that I have collected locally, but the sellers do have the poly-crates to send them in.

The guy I bought from uses a courier with experience in live animal transport - by all accounts as long as they are kept upright there is little problem with them spending 36-48hrs in the box. As it is dark they tend become subdued and are effectively asleep for the whole time.

We have a number of Koi that are quite happy to stay at the bottom of the pond for 4 months over winter without surfacing or feeding.

I agree we have tropical fish and they don't get flown over here swimming about in a ready made fish tank or pond. They are transported in the same way as they will be sent from ebay..

blue_monkey_2

Well, to be honest I thought that they kept some of the baby ones and then they grew into big ones for people to sell and this is why they cost more money - because they had to be fed extra food. Also they they were bred here.

I never even figured that they would all be bought in - OK, yes initially but I thought that they would just be born here and grow and that is why you can buy them at different sizes. I never even figured that they might come from another country and have to travel in little boxes to get here. I assumed that smaller fish would come in a big bag of water (like when I bought some fish they came in a huge bag and they had room to swim around) so they had room to move but surely a 13" fish would have to be packed quite tight so that it could not thrash about and hurt itself. Thank god it is sleeping then!!

Just seems wrong to be somehow, I honestly never figured you could buy fish via a mail order service. What if you was not in on a Friday and it was sent on Thursday - would the fish then have to be kept like that in the box until Monday when they try to deliver again?? I am not veggie or animal rights or anything but it just seems wrong to treat them like this. If it was a puppy or kitten people would be complaining, why any different because it is a fish?? It is still a living creature. I am obviously appearing to be pretty thick on this subject but I just don't get why it is 'right' to treat a large fish this way (I am mainly talking about the large Koi as small fish would have water to swim around in wouldn't they?).

Oh and yes, I did kind of think that if they we inported they would be transported by sea in special containers of water.

jasmineswhiskers

I just hope no-one sends via Royal Mail!