Saturday, December 19, 2015

Life As Art ... or Not

There may be no other creature on the planet less endangered than jellyfish but that still doesn't make them toys.  The headline reads:  Now You Can Own Pet Jellyfish, Because Goldfish Are So 2015

Jellyfish Art offers a package with a designer fish tank, colored lights and all you need is to add water.  Can't say they're wrong that it's pretty to watch but there's more to it than that.

Jellyfish are marine animals and maintaining marine aquaria is much more complex and difficult than maintaining freshwater tanks.  With fresh water, you don't need to do much more to maintain the health of the tank than keep the temperature right and ensure the pH doesn't get too far out of whack.  For salt water, those requirements are only openers.  Although we have raised many, many fish in fresh water tanks, we never screwed with salt water because it's hella easy to wipe out every creature in the tank.

Maybe the thinking is the jellyfish can be easily replaced and there's no shortage of them anyway but disposable life is an odious concept no matter how pretty it may look for a short while.


There's one sure thing about those 2015 goldfish:  it's almost impossible to kill them.

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