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  • What would you rather have, a new car, or this fish?

  • Turns out they cost around the same.

  • A single dragon fish can go for tens of thousands of dollars.

  • So, what's so special about it?

  • Well, it might not look it, but this endangered fish is so coveted, people have actually gone to prison over it.

  • The dragon fish gets its nickname for how it resembles a dragon in flight as it swims.

  • However, its real name is the Asian arowana.

  • It's a freshwater fish native to Southeast Asia, and it has taken the aquarium market by storm.

  • Today, these fish are so prized that some have their own motorcades, and breeders protect their stock with layers of concrete walls, complete with guard dogs and watchmen.

  • There's even a market for cosmetic surgery to help subpar fish who need eye lifts or chin tucks.

  • And that may sound like overkill, but it's really not.

  • It's a very valuable commodity, and that had driven a tremendous amount of crime around the areas where it's bred.

  • That's Emily Voigt, who explores this world for her book, "The Dragon Behind the Glass."

  • We're talking murder and midnight fish-napping.

  • This wasn't always the case, however.

  • Up until the second half of the 20th century, these fish weren't flaunted.

  • They were fileted and eaten by locals.

  • Then, in 1967, an aquarium trader traveling through northern Malaysia saw a dead arowana at a food market and found it so attractive that he sought one out to keep as a pet.

  • By the 1980s, arowanas had turned up in Taiwan, and eventually people all over Asia wanted one.

  • In particular, the red and gold varieties of arowana came to symbolize luck and wealth in several Asian cultures.

  • All that has led to a whole mythology about the fish.

  • It's supposed to bring good luck and prosperity, even to jump out of its tank to save its owner.

  • Nowadays, breeding for new color combinations is all the rage.

  • Like this fish, called the chili red, which you can get for around $1,400 each.

  • Or the emerald violet fusion super red, which goes for about $12,000 each.

  • But no fish is more rare and valuable than the albino.

  • In 2009, one of these supposedly set a record, selling for $300,000 to an anonymous high ranking official in the Chinese government.

  • In fact, most people who buy dragon fish are middle-class Chinese men, who'll collect the fish as a status symbol.

  • So keeping this fish is very much a macho hobby.

  • There's not a lot of women that do it.

  • And it's almost like collecting cars or something like that.

  • So in the mid-90s, when dragon fish were successfully bred in captivity on certified farms, it was a big deal, because they were becoming rare in the wild due to overfishing and harvesting for the pet trade.

  • Since then, more demand has led to breeding operations all over Southeast Asia.

  • And while it's perfectly legal to buy a dragon fish in the area, it may not be in other non-Asian countries.

  • In the US, for example, you can only find the Asian arowana on the black market.

  • And in fact, you can't bring it into the country legally, because it's banned by the US Endangered Species Act.

  • People have actually gone to prison for trafficking this fish.

  • So if you have an itch to have a dragon-like pet, maybe you should stick to something safer, like bearded dragons.

What would you rather have, a new car, or this fish?

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ドラゴンフィッシュが高価な理由|高価な理由 (Why Dragon Fish Are So Expensive | So Expensive)

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    April Lu に公開 2021 年 01 月 14 日
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