When one code = 2,300 species: Expanding our understanding of the trade in aquatic marine wildlife

The trade of marine ornamental animals for home and public aquariums has grown into a major global industry. Since the 1990s, the aquarium hobby has shifted focus from fish to miniature reef ecosystems. Millions of marine fish and invertebrates are removed from coral reefs and associated habitats each year, and the majority are imported into the United States, with the remainder imported by Europe, Japan, and a handful of other countries. This shift in aquarium complexity demands increases in not only the volume but also the diversity of species harvested by collectors, who now must supply the trade with species sought for both aesthetics as well as ecosystem services (e.g., species that benefit the life support services of aquariums). Despite the recent growth and diversification of the aquarium trade, to date, data collection is not mandatory, and hence comprehensive information on species volume or diversity is wanting. The lack of this information makes it impossible to study trade pathways. Without species-specific volume and diversity data, it is unclear how importing and exporting governments can oversee this industry effectively. It is also unclear how sustainability should be encouraged given the paucity of data. To expand our knowledge and understanding of this trade, and to be able to effectively communicate this new understanding, we introduce the Marine Aquarium Biodiversity and Trade Flow online database (https://www.aquariumtradedata.org/). This tool was created as a means to assess the volume and diversity of marine fishes and/or invertebrates imported into the US over four years (2005, 2008, 2009, and 2011) and one month of additional data in 2000. It is available online for perusal by the public which will help communicate this new understanding in the trade of aquatic wildlife. To create this online tool, invoices pertaining to shipments of live marine fish and invertebrates were scanned and analyzed for species name, quantity, country of origin, and city of import destination. The results for October 2000 as well as the year between June 2004 and May 2005 have been published (Rhyne et al. 2012, http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0035808; Balboa 2003). Here we focus on the later three years of data and also produce an estimate of fish to create complete calendar years for 2000, 2004, and 2005. The three-year aggregate totals indicate that just under 2,300 fish and 725 invertebrate species were imported into the US, even though each year, just shy of 1,800 fish and 550 invertebrate species were traded. Overall, the total number of live marine animals decreased between 2008 and 2011. In 2008, 2009, and 2011, the total number of individual fish (8.2, 7.3, and 6.9 million) and invertebrates (4.2, 3.7, and 3.6 million) assessed by analyzing the invoice data are roughly 60% of the total volumes recorded through the LEMIS dataset.