150+ Hypancistrus zebra got stolen!

[DutchFry]

Very sad news from Germany!

a guy who breeds H. zebra is robbed during the night. two men broke in and stole all of his zebra's, more then 150 specimens!

they were probably very rough when catching the fishes, because several specimens were found dead on the floor what a nightmare this must be! can you imagine?

for those who can read German:

http://www.forum.l46.de/viewtopic.php?t=4199 (need to log in)

http://www.newsclick.de/index.jsp/menui ... tle/Ticker (news flash)

[Richard B]

good grief! That's awful - pity they didn't stick their hand in a tank with a marine lionfish or an electric eel!

[L number Banana]

Makes me queasy just thinking about it. The value is bad enough but the poor guy must be heartbroken seeing the dead fish too .

[MatsP]

Terrible. Filthy scum thieves!

--
Mats

[fischkringli]

poor fish and poor you. Its really a nightmare. I hope they will cath this thiefes.

[MatsP]

poor fish and poor you. Its really a nightmare. I hope they will cath this thiefes.

Couldn't agree more. "Fortunately" I don't think it was one of the members here that lost the fish. Not that makes it better in itself ...

--
Mats

[Lloydy]

God that's so awful! Some people really deserve to have their hands chopped off!

Few other people posting about this.

http://www.zebrapleco.com/forum/viewtop ... 31c33cea95

[andywoolloo]

that's terrible! truly horrendous! something that valuable maybe should have an alarm on the fish room. I am sure in future it will tho. Poor little things, how scary for them to be manhandled like that!

Well, consolation if the perpatrators are located tho, stiff crimes they committed. PC 459 (burglary) is a felony, the dollar loss is a felony pc 487 grand theft, conspiracy to commit maybe also a tacked on crime. I am sure there are others that can be added. If the homeowner was home at the time could be considered a home invasion, felony pc 212.5

My sympathies to the breeder. May the police catch them fast and some zebras be recovered. Alive I hope.

I wonder if something like that is covered on a homeowners policy?

[Lloydy]

I wonder if something like that is covered on a homeowners policy?

You can insure your car, life, house, pet but not sure about fish.

Maybe you can set them as a high value item on your contents insurance. If not does anyone want to buy pleco insurance from me?

[MatsP]

"Lloydy's (fish) register" - Sounds familiar in insurance business.... ;)

I'm pretty sure that if you talk to the RIGHT insurance company, they will cover such a thing - at least for theft, if not accidental death. Whether the cost is such that it's nearly no point is of course a different matter.

--
Mats

[Lloydy]

Well I have worked in a life insurance broker for the past 6 1/2 yrs. If it works for humans why not rare fish.

Maybe just do the more expensive types. L46s, blue eyes, a few arowana's.

Numbers might be a bit sketchy but if you can work out the estimated worth, mortality rates etc you could do something. Even saying this premiums are likely to be low - £1 - £10pm range? Sell a few thousand policies a month and you might have a business ;)

[MatsP]

Yeah, but you have to deal with the not-so-clever people that do not realize that putting a £200 fish in a tank that has been running for 2 weeks!

--
Mats

[Lloydy]

Most term assurance life insurance policies will not pay out on suicide during the first 12 months. Maybe there needs to be similar clauses written into the contract for fish. No payouts during first 1 month of the policy. This would stop people insuring fish which are already looking ill.

Maybe risk factors would include

Tank mates
Tank size
Age
Size of fish
Species
etc.

I think this should be considered as just a fun side project rather than a serious business idea

[Lloydy]

Although marketing slogans could be

Assure your arowana
Protect your plec
Cover your catfish

and so on

[Bas Pels]

I would think the contract would specify the demands

Thus a insurance for H zebra would require warm water - over 27 C, weekly water changes of over 25 %, a tank of 120 * 30 * 30 or larger, with a turnaround rate of over 5 times an hour

if not - no pay out, as the cause of deadth is the owner

This could do a lot of good for many fishes don't you think?

for instance, for a RTC, this could result in a 4* 2 * 2 meters tank et cetera

[sidguppy]

this is awful.....

especially when you consider the fact that it's likely done by people who knew the fish were there

about 3/4 of all burglaries are done by perpetrators known by the victim who have been in the house before or who are relatives or friends of those who have visited.
wich tells me quite enough of people.

especially sore given the fact that so many fish were found dead.....if those thieves were a bit "professional", that wouldn't have happened
likely they were dumb idiots who heard somewhere that those fish are costly.
there's a fair chance they don't know how to take care of the fish and the whole drama will result in hundreds of dead Zebra pleco's.

I sure hope 1 thing; that the German police is a lot better and more competent that the Dutch police.

[fischkringli]

sidguppy wrote:

I sure hope 1 thing; that the German police is a lot better and more competent that the Dutch police

I hope, too. They caught a Koi thief at 2005 I think. I hope This thief will be caught, too.

[sidguppy]

uhuh
sad but true

the latest news about crime in the Netherlands was that it was going down and they planned on closing prisons

now that is not the case, crime is going up, but most people don't bother calling the police anymore...because the cops don't show up, or IF they show up, they'll show up late and they don't do a thing about it, treat the victims with contempt and release the perpetrators almost always.

with the exception of victims who stand up for themsrlves (or others) and take right into their own hands
THEN the cops go mideaval on them.

NL = crime heaven. if you're a burglar, a rapist, a child molester, a thief or a violent person; this country is the best place on earth.
the jurists turn you into a victim, the real victims are out in the cold and anyone who does some real justice is pounded down.
cops don't like it when the citizens show em how incompetent they are.

I'm not making this up:
ID the cops catch these guys with the fish on em in the Netherlands, you still can forget about getting the fish back (!) and the thieves will be released the very same day.
really.
if anyone catches these fish thieves and roughs them up a bit, those people can be sued by the thieves and in most cases the thieves will win that case....
I'm really not making this up.

[fischkringli]

In Germany the crime of the ollder persons go up and the crime of the young people go down a bit. I hope the there are traces, that belong to the thief.
Still cant believe this

[BrownBullhead]

I wonder if something like that is covered on a homeowners policy?

You can insure your car, life, house, pet but not sure about fish.

Our homeowners policy has a "ornamental aquarium fish" (sic) clause for $1,000 CAD; I don't know if that is hardware, livestock, or what ... I've never asked our insurance reseller for details, but we do have it. I guess if we ever have a home disaster, it will at least allow me to "start again" in the hobby, albeit far more modest than the current investment I maintain in my equipment and livestock.

[MatsP]

I'm pretty sure that if you want to extend the amount of aquarium cost covered by the insurance, all it takes is that you ask your insurance company to add to it. I have bicycles that cost about 3x the amount the insurance company will pay for a bicycle, and I just told them that "I've got these two bicycles" with some documentation [frame number]. They just add a small amount (I think it's about £5 per £1000 - but I'm sure that varies from company to company). Likewise, one of my camera lenses is worth more than the upper limit of "general items", so it is listed as "valuable".

I'm pretty sure that if I wanted to, I could add my fish-tanks to the list of valuable items, but I don't think it's worth it - although not any single tank is above the threshold, so I expect it may actually be covered in itself.

--
Mats

[Bas Pels]

My insurance asked for anything over 10.000 euros - which I don't have. After all, 30 tanks are 30 items, right

But to keep matters safe, I mentioned my 400 cm tank. I paid a lot less for it, but now the company does have a few euros extra. In case of trouble, I think it is well spend - but I rather have it wasted

[leej24]

Wow. Very sad indeed. I think I would personally stop raising fish due to depression of the loss.

[apistomaster]

I pay extra for insurance on my fish and facilities against fire, theft or other disasters but not for losses under my care.

[Jools]

Strikes me as a rather dumb crime - I mean how do you sensibly offload ~£15K of zebra plecos in a relatively short timeframe? I wonder if a DNA test would prove fish were from the stolen batch or not.

Jools

[jerry58]

Hi
One way of making it a bit harder to get rid of fish like these ones would be to chip them like a cat or dog (only smaller)anybody know if this has been done by anybody yet I'm sure it won't be long if not done yet
Could it be done without damaging the fish?.
It would make it easier to find them after the fact and insurance maybe more chance of taking them on !!

Jerry

[MatsP]

I'm sure the technology of chipping furry pets also works for fish, but it may be a bit hard to make the chip itself both work [1] and be small enough to fit a young zebra pleco [I presume a lot of these fish are fry/juveniles rather than adults]. It would certainly work for larger fish, particularly those with soft tissue immediately under the skin (plecos have a lot of bony plates immediately under the skin, except for the belly area, which is full of sensitive organs - again, it would probably work for a common pleco too).

I agree with Jools, it's either VERY well organized (someone with a distribution chain already in place) or stupid crime. Probably the latter.

[1] The chip used is a transponder. It needs to have a large enough antennae to be able to receive enough energy to act as a radio transmitter. It's not a lot of energy, but it needs to be a certain amount.

--
Mats

[Acid John]

I thought all asian Arrowanas were microchipped so that exploitation of wild stocks could be controlled.

[sidguppy]

many Asian Aro's in the netherlands are chipped.

but the asian aro is a big fish.....

I agree with Shane that the theft is done by idiots. the fact that so many fish were left for dead is a fair indication.
any zebra plec is worth several hundred euro's, so professionals would have taken them all.

it's quite likely afther the theft that selling them was problematic and keeping them alive also.
it wouldn't surprise me if the thieves dumped the whole batch somewhere in the sewers or beside the road, once they found that out......

[Lloydy]

I agree with Jools, it's either VERY well organized (someone with a distribution chain already in place) or stupid crime. Probably the latter. Mats

I disagree Mats. The people actually carrying out the crime are probably not experts, but I wouldn't be surprised if this was masterminded by someone who knows a lot about plecs. The fact the criminals focused on just the L46s supports this and makes me think it was a well thought out crime. I assume they took the L46s to someone who had the ability to care for and set up a huge breeding program or a number of private buyers already lined up.