Keeping Aquarium Fish Where They Belong: Non-Native Species Concerns in the Industry
The aquarium fish industry includes thousands of species of freshwater and marine fish and invertebrates farmed or collected from all over the world. This global diversity keeps the aquarium hobby fascinating and fresh, but also troubles our natural resource agencies, especially when non-native fish are found in our environment. Join us, as we talk to Dr. Jeff Hill, a scientist at the University of Florida, to learn more about keeping non-native aquarium fish where they belong!
BIO:
Prior to graduate school, Dr. Jeff Hill was an aquarium fish producer, raising African cichlids on his farm in south Florida. Later, he decided to enter academia and received his M.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Florida studying peacock bass ecology and interactions with native predatory fishes in S. Florida. He then joined the University of Florida faculty in January 2006 and is now based at the UF/IFAS Tropical Aquaculture Laboratory (TAL) in Ruskin (near Tampa). His research, teaching, and extension activities focus on aquarium fish aquaculture (all aspects) and in non-native aquatic species.
Dr. Hill’s non-native species work is intended to provide science-based information on non-native aquatic species to natural resource agencies, industry, and other stakeholders. He is interested in the use of non-native species in aquaculture and in other human activities.
Dr. Hill is currently President of the Introduced Fish Section of the American Fisheries Society and a member of the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services’ Transgenic Aquatic Species Task Force, a scientific advisory committee evaluating applications for culturing transgenic species in Florida aquaculture. He is also a member of the Monitoring and Detection Committee and the Research Committee of the federal Aquatic Nuisance Species Task Force and a member of Florida’s Risk Assessment Sub-Working Group.