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The Kona Coast is known
as the Gold Coast

because it's famous
for yellow tangs.

25 major reef fish
dealers in Honolulu

ship out a million
yellow tangs a year.

They refer to Hawaii reef
wildlife as livestock.

Their warehouse is huge,

you could drive all the way around and you
wouldn't know what it was.

You need two things to be
an aquarium collector in Hawaii.

It's a pulse and 50 bucks.

They're coming from all over
the place to take our fish.

You know, when you get
a handful of people

trying to shut down a four
billion dollar industry,

they're going to mount,
uh, some response,

and they have done so.

Here we go to Rene Umberger's
point of view video,

and this is the attack.

He grabs the regulator,
rips it off.

There's the attack again,
he rips the regulator

right out of her mouth.

The regulator dangles freely.

If she hadn't found it,
she would have drowned.

Or she could've rushed
to the surface,

embolized, and died.

Violence shows the aquarium trade's
willingness to risk anything for money.

You are listening
to Ecotopia on KZFR.

Our guest tonight is
Robert Wintner, Snorkel Bob.

He's an activist fighting
the loss of tropical fish

and the destruction
of the coral reefs.

Every year we open the eyes

of thousands upon thousands
more people to what's going on.

These guys can go out
and empty any given reef,

and it's legal.
That can't be right!

But it's...
It's what's happening.

At any given moment,

there are 27 million
reef wildlife individuals

in the aquarium pipeline.

The pipeline begins at the point
of capture in a net...

and it ends when the fish goes
belly up in the home aquarium.

And demand comes
from the home hobbyist,

that's how the system works.

It's like cut flowers.

But this is marine wildlife.

The effect on reefs
worldwide is devastating.

This is a Hawaii treasure.

This is Hawaii culture.

It's not livestock...
and they're stealing it.

The consensus is our reefs are
nothing like they used to be.

I've seen species that were
available for sale before,

but are no longer available
because they are gone, just gone.

Still kind of sad to realize

the fish you own now was
actually once living happily

in a massive ocean, and is now
living in a box of water.

99% of these critters die
within a year of capture,

and they're dying
and being replaced.

That's a dark hobby.

The aquarium campaign didn't
really begin in a moment.

We identified
threats to reef health.

The first was gill nets.

They're also known
as walls of death.

They kill monk seals
and turtles,

both are endangered species.

On Maui, we recruited
a very loved Kapuna there,

Kimokeo Kapahulehua,

and put him in an outrigger
canoe, and he's paddling along,

and then we go underwater
in a gill net,

and it's trapping
a turtle who's dying.

"Tell DAR
to stop gill nets now."

And we ran that statewide,
it was very effective.

And, uh, that year,

gill nets were banned
on the island of Maui.

The rest of Hawaii
has regulations that are mostly,

uh, padding and fluff,
they're not very effective.

We worked to stop the gill net

for over harvesting
what they should not harvest.

We had a system
in Hawaiian management,

when to catch, how to catch,

with what you're going
to catch it for.

And we went by the season.

We would never harvest
everything all at once,

so we do not ever over fish.

The Supreme Court
of Hawaii ruled

that this aquarium trade must
defer to the Hawaiian culture,

also known as the host culture,
you cannot slap it in the face.

Well, obviously it's been
slapped in the face

time and time again
for the last 200 years.

This is hard to read,
I'm going to try.

"Miloli'i, last fishing
village in Hawaii Nei."

You know,
here you have an industry

where they're not taking,

they're making money
out of the tourists

to come on a boat,
take them diving.

There would be more...
More logic, yeah,

to have the fish stay there

and come to Hawaii
and go look at it.

But no take my fish and...

You know, a...
And put them in aquarium up in,

in New York City or Tennessee
or whatever, you know,

that's not their home.

When I look at my kapunas,

they didn't have science,
but they had a common sense.

Yeah? How much you take,
when to go,

they know all the moons
coming up, they're reading...

I mean, I look at my tutu men,
they was great, awes... awesome.

Never worry about
fish going deplete.

Kona and Miloli'i
is considered the Gold Coast

for collecting aquarium fish.

It is the most pristine coast
in the state of Hawaii.

We got this piece of property
from my grandfather,

who got it from his grandmother

back in the early days
of the Kingdom of Hawaii.

It gave them inspiration
and it gave them hope.

Our grandfather would never
agree on something like this.

I always stood
on the grounds of...

Of being a cultural
practitioner.

Our families down here,
we live on a system of balance

where we take only what we need
to feed our families.

Be careful,
everybody reach out together.

I know you guys not paddlers,

but no lean all
on one side, everybody.

- Oh!
- -Oh, what happened?

I remember my dad
going to meetings in Kona.

He realized there are
a lot of collectors

that were coming to our island
and collecting,

and he didn't agree with that.

He lobbied,
worked through the state,

he met the governor
to do something about this.

Some of our own native people
are hired by them to collect,

and it's... it's not pono,
you know, it's not right,

because they knew growing up
that they survived off the fish,

and whenever they have said
they've brainwashed them,

I feel it's not true.

It's overfishing
by these people.

You know, the state did not do a good job
to manage them properly.

This... the only industry I know

that can go 365 days a year

and take as much as they want.

That's not right.
That's not pono.

Fish are able
to sing to one another.

They are able to develop
complex social structures.

They develop
cultural traditions.

They can even talk
to one another underwater.

Most people don't know
this kind of thing about fish.

- Jonathan, how are you?
- Jonathan Balcombe is a biologist

with a PhD in ethology,

which is the study
of animal behavior.

His book is What a Fish Knows:

The Inner Lives
of Our Underwater Cousins.

- Jonathan, welcome to Take Two.
- Thanks for having me, A.

Alright. So, what are some of the common
misconceptions we have about fish?

That they're primitive. They're,
in fact, highly evolved,

they've been around
for 450 million years,

which is about 450 times
as long as we've been around.

It's often thought that
animals are just instinctual.

I... I think the best response
to that is to show

that they're not, is the flexibility
of animal behavior,

the fact that they will behave differently
in different settings,

the fact that they may have,
uh, may be in a certain state,

they may be hungry or in pain,

and it will change
the way they'll behave

in an otherwise
the same situation.

The problem with thinking
that it's all instinct

is it's sort of a way
to diminish the animal

as just a stimulus
response machine.

Given that fishes have
not just minds

but also emotions,
we know they have experiences.

Uh, they can experience pain,
they can experience pleasure.

They have wants, needs, desires.

They have feelings,
they're individuals.

This is something
that scientists

had not really been
giving much thought to

because we've had such
a dim view of these creatures.

One of the challenges of any
aspect of studying the inner life,

the conscious world
of another species,

is they're not just going
to tell you how they're feeling,

so we kind of have
to be creative

and observant and surmise.

People who live near a reef,

who get in the water on a regular basis,
will tell you

they can see a fish and then see them again
and then see them again,

and the same thing happens

as if you see
the same person at the mall.

Uh, recognition, familiarity,
friendship.

And I was out there
once with my dive buddy,

and I did
a double take to my side

because there was somebody
who was coming up. And I looked,

and it was
a yellow-margin moray, you know.

Got a picture.
He was schooling up with us.

We saw him several more times.

I nicknamed him Kukla.

He was a little long
in the tooth,

didn't have all his teeth.

And I estimate Kukla
at about 27, 28 years old.

Just the easiest going guy.

I could be swimming along
and Kukla would come out,

and every time I'd come up
for another close up,

and he, he likes it,
he gives me poses.

He's... he's just
a wonderful friend.

Many fish,
such as butterflyfish,

live on a coral patch
that is, you know,

more or less the size of a room.

A male and a female will bond.

They maintain the coral,

they actually go around together
and work together

to just pick off the algae
that's growing on the coral,

and then they eat
the little coral polyps and,

you know, that's their home.

And they will mate for life.

The natural lifespan of fish
can be years or even decades.

But unfortunately, the sad fact
is that in captivity,

some fish live
only a few days or a few weeks.

Your initial question was what's
the condition of reefs worldwide?

And there's so many layers
and so many connections

that it's hard to tell where
one stops and the next starts.

In Third World countries,
the trade makes a case

that they're providing
livelihood for people

who wouldn't be able
to make money in any other way.

In a world famous reef area

known for ornate, intricate
little critters,

they still use cyanide.

Cyanide is highly toxic.

This is a chemical
that stops oxygen

from being able
to reach the brain.

They swim down
with an ounce vial of cyanide,

open the vial,
and it'll stun the fish.

They can't tell if they're dead or not,
they put them all in a bucket.

The ones that come to,

get shipped out
for the aquarium trade.

The ones that don't
come to, go back over.

We estimate that probably 90%,

and that's a lot,
90% of the wild caught fish

that are imported to the US

were caught with cyanide.

Cyanide is killing the animals,

also killing the reef.

So then, that's home,
that's where they procreate,

that's where they feed.

So, once you've
killed the coral,

you've killed
the entire ecosystem

that depends on the coral.

They use dynamite
to the same effect.

-They'll drop a blasting cap on a reef...

it'll explode,
obviously it blows up the reef.

It kills many fish.

Uh, many fish don't die,
they're just stunned.

What are the long term
effects of this?

-As violent as dynamite is...

cyanide is worse.

Cyanide, if it doesn't kill,
causes liver function compromise

in both person or fish.

Most collectors in those areas

that use cyanide
have yellow eyes,

they're jaundiced.

How bad is the state of Hawaii?

As a steward,

Hawaii does not allow
cyanide or dynamite.

The aquarium collectors,

they use what are called
tickle sticks.

In our swimming out there, we
started seeing aquarium collectors,

we thought, "What's wrong
with this picture?"

You know, seeing
how they do their job.

They'd come
into the finger coral,

it is primary habitat
for several species,

including the yellow tang.

They use
a billy club or a stick,

and they tap it or smash it,

herding all the fish
into a big net.

So I took some pictures of it.

Paul risked his life

to go out and take pictures

of the people who are
destroying our reefs

and collecting aquarium fish.

I wasn't bashful, I would wait

for the aquarium poachers
to come up and say,

"Hey, I had a camera and I... I think
you might be breaking the law."

I just kept doing that,
and some of the collectors

quit coming into the bay,
some didn't.

Then, they reach into that net

and grasp the fish by hand.

That's traumatic.

On real exotic fish
from greater depths,

they take a hypodermic syringe.

Instead of raising them
slowly to the surface,

they bring them up quickly,
because they're anxious

to get the fish
to market before they die.

And they use a needle

to puncture the animals'
swim bladder.

Getting rid
of the air inside them.

And I don't need to tell you
but I will, it's traumatic.

Once they get the fish
up to the boat,

they may... there may be
spines on the fish,

and they will actually
trim those spines using,

you know, scissors
and this sort of thing,

which really is like
cutting off someone's finger.

And why do they do that?
Because they're sharp,

and they want to put them
in a plastic bag,

and if it puncture
that plastic bag

with its dorsal spikes,

he dies and they
don't get their money.

And then what?
Out in the open air,

it can't breathe.

Fish need to be in water
in order to breathe.

Can you imagine
the level of stress?

Then they put the fish
in the cooler, trauma,

for the bumpy ride,
trauma, back to the dock,

then into a truck, trauma.

They ship the fish
in a small bag of water,

and if the fish goes
shee-shee or number two,

it fouls the water,

and a much greater chance
of the fish dying.

If they starve them, then it's
less chance of that happening.

You can actually see
these yellow tangs shipping out,

and their ribs are sticking out.

The campaign to ban
the aquarium trade

succeeded when the 2010
Maui County Council

banned animal cruelty.

The collectors and dealers
left Maui for Kona

for a life of unencumbered
reef exploitation.

When I was younger,
what I did have was two fish.

And, um, I had one fish
initially who we called "Fish,"

and another fish
who we called "Chips."

In our case, we didn't know

the types of water treatment
that the fish required,

didn't know, um, that
overfeeding them can kill them,

didn't know that different
toxins can kill them.

And so, like a lot of people,
we were vastly underprepared,

and so the fish ultimately died

as a result of, um,
our lack of basic understanding

of what fish need to survive.

I was always into fish
when I was a kid.

Started off with, uh,
just a fish bowl

that I was breeding guppies in,

and then I moved up
to a bigger tank.

I've worked in private, like,
aquarium maintenance companies.

I've seen accidents
from general negligence.

Every fish
in the entire system was dead.

Well, that was
easily 100, 150 fish.

You get people that have tanks
on a big, huge wall that,

you know, they want it to be
pretty, they want the live reefs,

and they want certain colors
as opposed to even a species.

They just say,
"Well, I want a blue and a red

and an orange fish."

Never mind those fish
wouldn't actually be found

anywhere near
each other on a reef.

And they're probably going
to end up killing each other,

hurting each other, or not being
able to live in that community.

And they just... end up dying,

and they buy more.

We've been keeping fishes
in tanks for a long time.

And it presents some quandaries.

On the one hand,
it's a great way

to look at them up close

and see the beauty of them,
see how they move around.

You can see aspects
of their behavior

and learn things from them
by watching them in captivity.

But there is that side of it,
the captivity aspect.

The fact is you are taking away

perhaps their most
precious possession,

which is their freedom.

A recent PETA investigation
of a national pet store chain

uncovered egregious
cruelty to animals.

We found that dozens of fish
per day were dead on arrival.

I think pet stores
see fish and other animals

as mere commodities
who they mass produce

in order to sell
and turn a profit.

Any time you receive
an order of fish

while working
at a fish store, pet store,

it's not uncommon at all

for there to be dead fish
in that shipment.

So, they skim the surf
on Waikiki Beach.

Our cameraman is running
alongside in a canoe.

In Hawaii, the moon hangs so low
that lovers lean against it.

Aquarium collection
began in Hawaii

when the jets could start
coming, and it was like 1970.

So collection started early

and mostly on Oahu.

There was already
people feeling, a long time ago,

"This might not be okay," sort of
from an ethical-moral foundation,

not... no science data
on how much,

what would be sustainable
harvest or anything.

And many people over the years

have been asking the state
to do that environmental review,

in addition to phasing out
or ending the industry.

They've never
basically assessed,

"Is there an effect on the reef?

Is there an effect
on the fish populations?"

At that point,
people who were thinking,

"We need to look into this,"
sued the state.

So the environmental review part

ended up being
litigated in court.

Okay.

Alrighty.

My name was given from my dad

after one of his favorite
grandfathers,

who was named Kaimi.

And it's a family name
and the name means "seeker."

I'm a fifth generation
native Hawaiian.

I've been a plaintiff
with my dad

in regards to, uh, lawsuit.

Families and different
organizations are suing

the Department of Land
and Natural Resources

to stop, um,

aquarium fish collection
in the state of Hawaii.

I was asked to do
some research for a lawsuit.

One, is it possible
that the f... these fish

are important to the coral reef?

And two, that
they've been diminished

by removing aquarium fish?

And it took many,
many years, you know,

went all the way
up through the court.

It was easy to show that it's highly
likely that it could impact the reef.

There was also a subtle side
message, it's kind of scary

but I think really important.
We make this assumption,

as people and scientists,

that because
organisms reproduce,

if their numbers get really low,
we can bring them back.

If we stop doing whatever we're
doing, they will come back.

But that doesn't always
turn out to be the case,

because if we let
this go too far,

it's possible that
they will not come back.

This is Mind Over Matters
on KEXP Seattle 90.3 FM.

My guest this morning
is Robert Wintner.

What is the importance
of ocean reefs?

It's one of the great mysteries
and treasures of planet Earth.

90% of all creatures
in the ocean

spend their infancy on a reef,

where they have plenty of cover.

Reefs are in peril
all over the world.

We have seen reefs in French
Polynesia vanish in 15 months,

turned to rubble and sand.

There's balance
between habitat and species,

and to pull the fish,

these beautiful, bright
colored fish off the reefs

by the millions
for an amusement industry

is obscene, immoral,
and should stop.

It should be illegal, and that's what we're
in the process of seeking.

Pono is who you're with.
Are you with God?

Are you with the ocean? Yeah?

You make pono.

We get a... we get fish gods
out there checking you out.

So you don't go out there
and hana 'ino,

you know, make wrong.

Malama.

That's the key, take care.

Whilst, to some extent, humans,
as the caretakers of the planet

and the planet's most intrepid
travelers and explorers,

uh, we have an interest in saving the seas
for our own benefit.

I think it's much
more important,

uh, for the millions
of species whose lives

and existence
very much depend on it.

To humans, it's the sea,

but to marine life,
it's where they live.

Coral reefs are like rainforest,

because they have
high abundance of life

and high biodiversity.

Are the fish important
to the reef?

Surely, and the reef
is important to the fish.

71% of the earth is
presently covered with ocean.

Carbon dioxide is
absorbed by algae

that live inside the coral.

When they make sugar,
they also produce oxygen.

And since the ocean is so vast,

they're creating the huge
percentage of the oxygen.

A lot of the fish that are collected
for the aquarium trade

eat those algae.

We can think of them
as lawn mowers.

They're like little
salad eaters all day long.

By eating algae,
the fish prevent it

from growing all over the coral
and blocking the sunlight.

If the fish aren't there,

then the coral will die.

This leads to a loss
of biodiversity,

and new coral cannot settle.

So we basically have lost
the coral reef ecosystem.

One of the greatest problems
faced by coral reef fish

is that the corals are becoming
increasingly stressed.

These problems
don't exist independently

in their own vacuum,
they're additive.

If we have coral bleaching and we have
over collection for the aquarium trade,

and they are working
to create havoc,

that is extremely problematic.

Coral is also valued by humans.

Adventurers risk their lives
diving to great depths

for coral off the shores
of Maui.

Maui is one of the few
places in the world

where black coral is found,

and it comes glistening
up from the depths

like a gnarled freak
miniature tree.

But so firmly rooted is it
that it has to be hacked

from the seabed,
sometimes with a sword.

This is death, yet paradoxically,
it resembles living beauty,

for soon it will be made
into delicate jewelry

for discerning women
the world over.

So when you see
coral jewelry, think,

"Where did that come from?"

The coral that
is used in jewelry

is principally deep water coral.

And it is in nature
even extremely rare.

And people value it
because of that rarity.

The reefs are challenged.

This very valuable place,
the coral reef,

is valuable for its food fish,

for its beauty,
protection from storms,

its spiritual value,
for its ecotourism value.

The reef is part
of the reason people come here.

Reef based tourism generates

800 million dollars
a year in Hawaii.

We have, um, protected bay...

Hanauma Bay.

It shows that sharp contrast

between what happens
when you protect an area

and when you let
full scale extraction occur.

Aquarium fish removal
is a form of exploitation.

I see tourists come
and they go in the water,

and if I'm in the places that I swim
that I know are degraded reefs,

it makes me sad because I feel like
they're not going to get to see

what really they were imagining.

In my limited
scientific knowledge,

I always figured that the bigger
the fish, the bigger the brain,

which means a fish like, say, a
shark, that's why they're so amazing,

they hunt in packs, they know
exactly what they're doing.

So a fish, like, say, a minnow,
it has intellectual depth?

Sure. Take the frillfin goby,

they live in the intertidal
zones, so they...

They can hop around
between tide pools at low tide.

They memorize the topography

of this tide pool zone
at high tide,

so they can translate
that aerial view at high tide

into a horizontal view
at low tide.

It's what's called
mental mapping.

And they can remember it
40 days later.

And it's a very
small fish with probably

quite a small brain.

They have not just biology
but they have biographies.

They're unique, each one.

The more
I've learned about fish,

the more I've learned just
how really amazing they are.

The cognitive abilities of fish
in many ways match or exceed

those of so called higher
order vertebrates,

even some non-human primates.

There's individual
personalities.

I've seen fish that will let you

pet them like a dog
and feed them by hand,

and everything
that they're doing

and every behavior
they're exhibiting

would make you think
that they're loving you

and bonding with you
like a dog would.

In Hawaii, we've had campaigns

in the three areas
of government,

executive,
legislative and judicial,

and in every, uh,
segment of the campaign,

the aquarium trade
want to shout us down,

and they say,
"It's not true, it's not true.

This is not devastating."

And so I refer to this crowd

as the torch
and pitchfork crowd.

We see the aquarium trade,
pardon me, as bad guys,

and... and we want to stop them.

No more starvation,
no more fin cutting.

No more hypodermic
puncture is allowed.

And the president
of the Kona Aquarium Association

in a public hearing said,

"Snorkel Bob," that's me,

"is an ecoterrorist."
And when I saw that, I laughed,

because I have sent
some incendiary emails.

But ecoterrorist seems
a bit of a stretch.

Bill 318 asks the basic
business questions.

Who owns the reef wildlife
on Big Island reefs?

Is it really inventory?
Is that inventory unlimited?

The Snorkel Bob Foundation cannot
campaign politically in an election.

We also can't be involved
in any political lobbying.

When I lobby, most of the time,
I lobby as an individual.

The aquarium trade has no data

on environmental impact
or Hawaiian cultural impact.

For these reasons and many more,
this county council

urged the governor
and legislature last year...

- I'll have to ask you... -...to
ban the aquarium trade statewide.

I trust this council will be
consistent in its values

and economic assessment,
passing Bill 318.

- Sorry for the overtime.
- Okay, thank you.

This is a contact sport.

Uh, we think
we're making headway.

There is no greater
gratification in the world

than a win. We think we have
some significant wins

right now, uh, within reach.

And so, we're going
at it every way we can.

The Cuba trip
was a real eye opener.

I'd seen footage
on Jardines de la Reina,

the gardens of the Queen,

and it just looked remarkable.

It's about 1,000 acres...

70 miles south
of the Cuban coast.

Say what you will
about Fidel Castro,

one day he said,
"Stop taking sharks."

When I was there, I said,
"How can you take your sharks?

You're so far from Asia.
That's who wants sharks."

The fella
who ran the resort said,

"Well, sharks were
our protein staple.

We ate them all."

Jardines de la Reina was
gang raped and left for dead.

It was a dead zone.

Within two or three years,
and the ocean is resilient,

this is what gives us hope,

every reef should
have the capacity

to support about 20 sharks.

In a very short time, the sharks came back
to Jardines.

That first dive,

we went out to the site...

and our dive leader,
Miguel, said, "Okay,

this is a very special spot,

not too many sharks."

We're water dogs,
we know the drill.

And we saw a dorsal fin...
Here's the surface, dorsal fin.

The obvious first glance
is sharks everywhere.

Miguel says, "It's okay.
Do not hesitate.

Get in, go down."
It was like...

and we go, "Came that far."

And we roll back
and... and went down.

You descend into a garden

that is so abundant, so diverse.

You forget about the sharks
until they start circling you.

They follow you, it's like
your... your house animals.

An... and I would say,
by day three,

the sharks would come by
and they'd just, you know,

knock a strobe arm
or bump us with a dorsal.

That's a check,
that's what sharks do,

they want to see
if you're still alive

or if you are risk free.

100% host of apex predators.

100% coral cover.

And optimal biodiversity,
as Neptune intended.

Cuba is now in the lead position

on reef rejuvenation
in the world.

No place else on earth has this.

Unfortunately...

they're taking
their sharks again.

China is a close
affiliate with Cuba

and they're demanding sharks,

and Cuba is now
taking sharks again.

This is a nonstop campaign.

Jardines de la Reina
and all the pure reefs of Cuba

have one flaw,

lionfish.

They've come that far south.

Lionfish are
a perfect microcosm.

Uh, the before
and the after that can happen

when you take nature
past the tipping point.

They're so voracious,

they're very difficult
to keep in an aquarium,

and anything else
that's in that aquarium,

the lionfish will gobble up.

And they get pretty big,
they can get up to,

you know, 12, 14 inches.

And because the pet owner
doesn't have the heart

to kill them, they're released.

Where lionfish are natural,

the predators
keep them in balance.

The lionfish did
not swim to the Atlantic...

they didn't go there
voluntarily.

It all comes down
to the greater subject

of wildlife trafficking
for the pet trade.

A lionfish will eat all the fry
of the other species.

And lionfish spread all over
the South Atlantic seaboard.

Lionfish outnumber
all other species

in the Atlantic and Caribbean,

they've shown remarkable
adaptation

to depth and temperature range.

It is the biggest marine
catastrophe in the modern era.

What we've seen is
reaction among humans,

where they have now
lionfish rodeos.

And it's a way to vent
their frustration

on a scapegoat species,

the evil lionfish.

And they go out,
and they spear lionfish,

and they weigh them,
and they, "Ha, ha!

We're getting
the nasty little bastards."

As if that's
a solution. It's not.

Trafficking for the pet trade,

it's bad for the source,
uh, habitat,

it's bad
for the destination habitat.

The lionfish
are not at fault here.

Home hobbyists released them

because they didn't want
to flush them.

We are very conscious
of a lot of the land animals

that are endangered in Hawaii,

and what we see
happening on land

is happening underwater as well,

and may be much worse.

When it comes
to what's under the water,

we have allowed
that for 50 years.

It's not seeing, right? Every day
you're not looking into the forest

and seeing the birds.

You have to actually
get in the water

to see what's going on.

Humans don't pay
that much attention

to what happens underwater.

Fish don't scream out loud
the way that mammals do.

We have a very dynamic,
core group,

uh, reef community people
here in Hawaii

who are dedicated from the heart

because they... they hate
what they see happening.

Uh, and they want this to stop.

The thing that turtles have
going for them

is everybody loves the turtles.

People relate to turtles.

I relate to fish, sometimes
I can't understand

why more people don't relate
to fish the way I do.

I think they're so cute.

In Hawaii, turtles are still
legally, federally protected.

Every species of coral in Hawaii

is protected
by state regulation.

It is kapu,

you cannot take
one piece of substrate

from the ocean floor.

For the reef species,

zero protection, zero.

There was just a... a story about
people trying to sell green sand

from Hawaii on eBay,
and it had to be removed,

you cannot sell sand,
you cannot sell rocks,

live rock from the water,
you can't sell coral.

So, there's basically
only one type of organism

that can come off this reef
for sale with no limits,

and that's the small, juvenile,
beautiful aquarium fish.

Fishes have been
literally and figuratively

below the surface of our
thinking and our consciousness.

They live in another realm.
We've been alienated from them,

and I think why we're emerging
from this now, finally,

is that we have the technologies,
we have scuba gear,

we have underwater photography,
and you can watch YouTube videos

of fishes doing stuff that would've been
thought fantasy just a generation ago.

So, because they're not like us,

we don't think that
they're anywhere near us.

That's right,
I think the less human like

a species is, we're going
to be less able to relate.

So what's the science,
then, behind this idea

that fish are more
than just mindless,

uh, swimming/feeding machines?

It's a science
that really surprised me,

it was like, "Wow!"
They... they have thoughts,

they plan, they use tools,

they... they play,
they fall for optical illusions.

They have sex lives, they have
interesting social lives.

So it's really quite
an explosion of information

that we now have
coming out about fishes.

They are already a lot more interesting
than my daily life, actually,

all the things you
just mentioned, that's...

That's more than I do
in a single day.

So, give us some examples.

These little species of fish
called cleaner wrasses,

they're small,
maybe two, three inches long.

They're attractive, they advertise
they're open for business.

And business is
to remove parasites

from so called client fishes.

More than 100 species will
line up to wait their turn

on the reef to be serviced.

The cleaner fishes
will pluck off sea lice

and other parasites
from their skin.

The cleaners, of course,
get food from doing this,

and they will clean
hundreds a day.

And the clients get
a spa treatment

- and a parasite removal service.

The... the favorite food of cleaners
is actually the mucus layer,

they'll nip off
a little moat of that mucus,

and it causes usually
the client to jolt.

Other clients are watching
these interactions,

and they're forming
long term accounts

of the quality of service
that these cleaners do.

So cleaners will do a better job

if there's more clients
in the queue,

their eBay ratings
are more at stake.

They will do, uh, caresses,

they will rapidly flutter
their pectoral fins

against the bodies
of their clients.

The Big Island has come up
with a pseudo solution

to try and deal with the issue
of aquarium collecting.

And, uh, over the course
of ten years of negotiations,

this group of people
came up with a compromise.

Uh, Hawaii Department
of Land and Natural Resources

came out with a White List.

A White List as... a Black List
is what you can't do,

it's the species you can't take.

A White List is species
that are approved for removal.

Well, it turns out
that the species on the list

represent, I don't know, 99%
of what the trade already takes.

Uh, so the department spent
a lot of time and money,

uh, developing a list of species

the aquarium trade can take.

So this... this White List
that is supposed to, uh,

you know, be this new protective
rule, it is... is bogus, it's a sham.

The Director of Natural
Resources sat down

with a group
of aquarium collectors,

and they compiled
all the species they needed

to maintain 99%
of their revenue stream.

The Abercrombie administration,

they signed the White List.

Bottom line is,
it's not enforceable.

So who knows what's really
going to be leaving our reefs.

Those 40 species will still
be taken in unlimited numbers,

so we're still in trouble.

Among the interviews I did,
the guy said,

"Do fish have souls?"

I said, "Let me
rephrase the question.

Is this fish a friend
of mine? Yes!"

Anita and I went to Tahiti.

We found a...
A longhorn cowfish...

that we nicknamed Cowboy.

We were so excited
when we saw him,

they're named
for their longhorns,

he has a beautiful fantail.
He was extraordinary.

He was in shallow water,
eight to ten feet,

and we visited him probably
two or three times a day.

On each visit,
he just became more engaging.

Uh, and again,
it's an example of,

uh, familiarity and friendship.

Okay, now, I promise
this will be my last fish story.

It's a turtle story.

We were over
at Red Hill, Pu'u Ola'i.

The current was coming up,

and coming head on was,

uh, a Hawaiian green
sea turtle, or honu.

And I started to veer one way,
and she veered the same way.

I veered the opposite,
she veered the opposite.

And I thought,
"Is this a game of chicken?"

She's a big gal, she was
in the 350, 400 pound range.

And we were coming head on.

We got almost
to the point of contact,

and I sucked it up
and twisted this way,

she twisted that way,
and we passed.

I dropped down only, like,
eight, ten feet to the bottom,

uh, to get a shot
of another fish there.

And I felt this...

on my back, on my tank.

And I was
pretty sure who it was.

And I rolled over...

and there she was.

I'm pretty sure she wanted
to mate.

And I don't say that...
I mean, of course I'm facetious,

but, uh, you know, there are
natural attractions here,

I had the hard shell,
the wrinkly neck.

And it was... she just looked at me
so longingly, and I got the shot.

And it really captures
her essence and her love,

regardless of her motives.
And I love her right back.

And I said, "It's fun to speculate on the,
uh, the offspring,

you know, such wit, such verve,
such flippers."

Everybody making money on this,

everybody walking all over
these reefs to collect fish...

these are people who
would convert nature to money.

We actually had a bill last year
that passed the Legislature

to end the commercial capture

of wildlife
for aquarium purposes.

Welcome, Robert Wintner.

We last had him on this show
in February,

when he told us about
Hawaii's Bill SB1240.

We've urged listeners
to phone or email legislators

and the Governor urging
the passage of this bill.

It's been no walk
in the basil, believe me.

And we've been
at this for 11 years.

When SB1240 started
to gain traction,

we started
to really fight our way

through the House
and the Senate.

We experienced a growing
groundswell of support,

and now this is huge.

SB1240 will stop state
issued aquarium permits.

The current collectors
will be grandfathered in.

And it was actually
a great solution,

because it didn't
negatively impact

the current
commercial collectors

who might feed their families.

I just want to clarify.

Something will happen
this week, right?

I have to tell you, I feel good.

There has been much conversation
about Senate Bill 1240

relating to aquatic life.

Uh, in the final analysis,

I did decide to,
uh, veto that measure.

The Department of Land and Natural
Resources opposed the bill.

The agency claimed
that the removal

of over a million animals
a year has no effect.

It wasn't the perfect solution
from a conservation perspective,

but it was pretty darn close,
and it was a good compromise.

We passed committee conference,

and the guts
of the bill were intact,

and everybody celebrated.

SB1240 said, "On this issue,

our beautiful reefs,
there is hope.

We're going to make
a giant step forward."

We had support from all
over Hawaii and America.

We had nonprofit groups
jump on board,

hundreds of thousands
of supporters,

and he vetoed the bill.

We'll see what happens
moving forward.

The hope is that this year
there might be another bill

that can actually end
the industry.

A lot of the collectors, uh,
really do care for the resource.

They're not the enemy,

and they know that
the resource itself is depleted.

And yet,
from their perspectives,

their livelihood
depends on collecting.

We do recognize there'll be
some need for change,

and there are times when,
like this case,

it would mean
that people are out of work

and people who love their jobs.

They're all excellent divers.

There's a couple options. One, which
means they don't collect fish anymore,

is some sort of buyout, you know, at
least they'll be economically sound,

because they... they
do make those arguments.

This is a pretty big fishery,
so it'd cost some money.

If you want to make big money, there's
commercial diving, tech diving.

Try to figure out ways
to incentivize them

having new careers
with scholarships.

I mean,
these guys know the ocean.

Let's have them become
marine biologists

or marine research scientists,
or the one that I favor,

is learn
how to aquaculture these fish.

Today, the vast majority of freshwater fish
are aquacultured.

There have been a number
of saltwater marine fish

that are popular
in the aquarium trade,

the clown fish are aquacultured.

Let's make sure when we're
aquaculturing organisms

that they're raised,
you know, with respect.

I have noticed a change

in some of the smaller f...
Smaller shops

that are kind of moving
more towards sustainability.

More and more species that I had seen in
the trade were coming up captive bred,

and a lot of stores were using
that as kind of a selling point.

So it... it's just becoming
more and more commonplace.

So I figured, if they're
doing it with some species,

they can do it
with the other species.

And if they can't
figure out how to do it,

then we shouldn't
have them in an aquarium.

I don't think that
it's in the benefit

of the individual members
of the species

to breed them in captivity,

to keep them
in barren tanks indefinitely,

where their breeding schedules
and their feeding schedules

are wholly artificially
reliant on humans,

where they will live
their lives in captivity.

I don't think that's
an existence

that we necessarily
want to encourage.

These are thinking,
feeling beings,

and we have
a responsibility to make sure

that their lives are lives
that are worth living.

You are taking away perhaps
their most precious possession,

which is their freedom.

There's actually
some places in the world

where they passed laws
making it illegal

to keep a fish in a little bowl.

So it's been recognized
legislatively, based on science,

that this is not a good
quality of life.

Keeping fish in glass tanks

says that humans are
the privileged observers

and manipulators
of the wildlife,

and fish are the framed objects

who exist for human
gratification.

So, rather than increase
public interest

in wildlife conservation,

aquariums embody the human,
uh, acquisitiveness

that has led to so much habitat
destruction and species,

uh, extinction over the years.

It's sort of the forever argument
for or against zoos or aquaria,

is that there are, yes,
some animals in captivity there,

and we... we may say that's not
the optimal life for them,

but because we're
such a powerful species,

you know, because we dominate,
we really need to manage.

If we can get people
connected to nature,

you know, just foster
in them an ecological ethic.

We have never had
any of our fish

displayed in any aquarium.

It was left where it belongs.

I got two amazing,
beautiful clownfish.

If they're dead, I will cry.

Oh, my God, they're perfect.

My favorite way to go with,
uh, saltwater is captive bred.

I know it can't always
be done, sadly.

Most fish are wild caught.

"Now, what's wrong with that?"
I mean, that's not sustainable.

It's almost like there's
this unspoken acceptance

that you're going
to lose animals.

Blue tangs get one foot long.

So, if you imagine a foot
swimming around,

it's a big fish, it cannot
live in a ten gallon tank,

it cannot live
in a 20 gallon tank,

it can't live
in any of those tanks.

We have a lot of rules about cruelty
towards our dogs, our cats.

And what do we have
in place for these animals?

You know, there's not enough
value placed on their lives.

When you remove
a fish from the reef,

there is a hole there for a while where
there used to be

a fish that hung out
or that knew that area.

So we... we're doing
something really weird,

we're objectifying them, yeah,

like they're
infinitely replaceable,

and that they're just
some sort of object.

We're not seeing them
as part of this neighborhood.

It's not a product, you know,

it is an organism
that has interactions,

you know,
we could even say a family,

it has descendants out there.

If we can get 25%
of home hobbyists to think,

I had no idea the damage
this was causing.

How these fish are caught.

The... the destruction
to habitat in the process,

the consequence
to herbivores not eating algae,

they would take up photography
or get a flat screen TV.

You can have a... an underwater
experience from your laptop.

We have reef cams now.

They're down there
night and day,

and you don't have
to kill anything,

you don't have
to compromise habitat.

The reef cam gives you
the live action.

The technology serves
a great purpose

and is really exciting
for what it will allow.

Augmented reality that can put
the user into the ocean.

Children and future generations,

they'll be able to improve
the lives of animals

that doesn't keep
them in captivity.

So there were advocates
who went forward,

they actually lost at the lower
and intermediate level,

but at the Hawaii
Supreme Court level, they won.

The Supreme Court
ruled in our favor

after battling five years.

The state agency in charge

of protecting
our public resources

has to stop allowing
commercial collection

until they go through the environmental
review process.

The state is not giving
any new permits,

there's about
231 active permits,

the majority of the permits
are in this coast of Kona.

They didn't stop
the current commercial license.

It's illegal,
but they have to enforce it.

We're all connected to the canoe

because our ancestors came
from the south islands

or the Polynesian island
called Tahiti

or Marquesas, by canoe.

We're very,
very connected to the canoe

and connected to ocean
because of that reason.

I made this trip all the way up
the National Monument

of Papahanaumokuakea.

From Hawaii to Kure,
it's almost 1,600 miles.

We paddled day,
night, day, night.

Papahanaumokuakea goes about
1,200 miles to the northwest

of the northernmost part
of the Hawaiian Islands.

It's huge.

I was driving on this road

right about here in 2007.

We got a call and said,
"It's a monument."

It was the northwestern Hawaiian
Islands Coral Reef Ecosystem Reserve.

If you think Papahanaumokuakea
is hard.

Papahanaumokuakea.

Papahanaumokuakea.

It's a shining light
in marine protection.

I sit on something called
the Reserve Advisory Council.

We've got Hawaiians,
Hawaiian elders,

citizens at large,
conservation, uh, experts,

scientists,
I'm the education rep.

And there is no extraction.

We really have
a preserved environment.

The biodiversity
up there is amazing.

The top predators
are the most abundant.

They've found
an incredibly high number

of endemic species, which is
a huge deal for scientists.

And we can apply
what we've learned

to the main Hawaiian islands,

which are fairly devastated.

Since it's so well
protected and so remote,

it's probably one of the most healthy,
pristine, intact ecosystems.

It's a very important spiritual
place to the Hawaiians.

One of the lower islands,
Mokumanamana,

sits at 23.5 degrees latitude,

which is right
on the Tropic of Cancer.

Very interesting
archaeological sites.

We think it was like Stonehenge.

On the equinox,
in Hawaiian culture,

that is the jumping
off place of souls,

that's a very special place
north of that, they knew that.

If we can tie our heart
to the value of nature,

for Western people it'd be
sort of the sense of the sacred.

Let's not look
at that fish as money.

You know, some people may look at it
as a friend, we may look at it as kin.

We may look at it as a being
that has its own value,

you know, however
that was given to it,

just by the fact
we share the planet with it.

The chant talks about
asking permission.

It reflects upon the po'e ka
lani, the people of heaven,

the po'e ka moana,
the people of the ocean,

and the po'e ka o 'aina,
the people of the land.

They say to all of us,

"I give you my heaven,
my ocean and my land.

You care for it as I have done."

I know of a lot of culture
that's extinct now.

It's really important
that the people of all Hawaii

preserve the Hawaiian culture.

We can embrace the world
of who we are, what we are,

what we have done
and where we're going.

Live in my culture,
teaching every day,

will keep my culture and legacy.

The main Hawaiian islands
could be a national monument

like Papahanaumokuakea.

And working together
with all the agencies of NOA

and the State and the community.

We will definitely
gain a better life

for the marine species.

We need to protect
all these resources.

God put all of fish
in the ocean.

Before, when I was small,
they was all over.

No sense come to the ocean,
there's no fish.

This industry
that they allowed...

they need to put a stop to,
that's all I'm thinking.

The Supreme Court says
it's illegal.

We need the Department
of Land and Natural Resources

to implement,

and the State,
they don't really enforce well.

The reefs are dying

because of us as humans
not doing what is right.

Hawaiian people, they knew
how to maintain balance.

The representatives
are supposed to represent

the interests of the people,
not the other way around.

When they take from us,

they're taking
from our children's future.

And I'm calling
on the Hawaiian people

to get behind this also.

My bill for prohibiting, uh,
reef fish aquarium collecting,

it's going to be a fight.

The aquarium trade hired
big gun lobbying firms.

Our reefs are our public trust.

The fish in the ocean
are our public trust.

It's time for this to stop.

And I think we have
a very good chance.

We speak for the fish.

And believe me,
the fish are talking.