Freshwater variety has different patterns and commands different prices at pet shops and fish farms
Lin Yang Straits Times 28 Nov 10;
They make a delicious barbecued treat. But some Singaporeans prefer to keep stingrays alive, pampering them with shrimp for food and a climate-controlled tank.
One fish fancier even paid $200,000 for his stingray pet.
That man was Mr Matthew Yeo Kay Keng, 35. But the cash was allegedly not his. Last week, telco M1 said it was suing Mr Yeo for illicitly selling handsets to resellers and embezzling $2.09 million from the company.
Media reports said the former M1 employee had gone on a shopping spree and bought, among other things, a live stingray for $200,000.
The Sunday Times investigated to see if one stingray could conceivably be worth that much money.
In Singapore, pet shops and fish farms can sell freshwater stingrays to customers as pets.
These stingrays are smaller and have more colourful patterns on their skin than their marine cousins, which Singaporean foodies treat as a culinary delicacy.
One of the island's largest fish farms, Qian Hu, has about 45 stingrays in stock. But only serious buyers get to see the fish, which are kept in a restricted area.
Each of the tanks has five to 10 of them, gliding serenely just above the tank floor.
Qian Hu has in stock only a species called Leopoldi - prized for its speckle of white dots contrasting against dark skin.
'There is no set price for each fish,' explained Mr Tho Thiam Chye, an assistant sales manager at Qian Hu.
'Different patterns on the skin fetch different prices. But we sell each of these for between $10,000 and $20,000.'
In a good month, Qian Hu can sell 10 stingrays.
Mr Tho pointed to one of the more expensive ones - a larger ray with a denser dot pattern and unique, U-shaped specks mixed in.
'We'll sell that one for at least $16,000,' he said.
The value of a stingray depends on its skin pattern, size and gender, explained Mr Vince Koh, 43, a fengshui expert and former stingray enthusiast.
According to him, certain species have more dots on their bodies. Older stingrays tend to be bigger and have fancier patterns.
Finally, hobbyists tend to prefer females because they want them to produce offspring.
'There's also the albino. I know only one fish shop in the world that has it. One of those should be worth $65,000,' said Mr Koh.
What about $200,000 for a fish? 'That's impossible, I've never seen it, and would never pay that much,' he said.
But Qian Hu's Mr Tho will not rule out such pricing.
'It's like art. The value is really in the eye of the beholder. If it had a very special pattern, it could be worth $200,000,' he said.
Depending on when Mr Yeo bought his stingray, the high price could have been due to policy changes in Brazil, the native homeland of many stingray species.
In 2006, Brazil banned their export to protect domestic supply. Affected stingray prices increased five-fold.
Fish farms in Taiwan, Thailand and Malaysia responded by starting their own breeding operations.
Realising that they were losing brisk business, Brazil changed course last year by replacing the ban with export quotas on six stingray species. Now, 5,000 Leopoldis can leave that country each year.
Prices then cooled down.
In addition, the Agri-food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) made it easier for hobbyists in Singapore to acquire stingrays earlier this year.
Previously, only fish farms could sell them.
Since August, AVA has allowed their sale in pet shops as well, much to the chagrin of environmentalists.
Dr Peter Ng, a biologist from NUS, believes Upper Seletar Reservoir became infested with invasive South American stingrays when those who had the fish as pets decided to dump them.
The stingrays could upset the native food chain and cause injury to kayakers with their poisonous stingers.
'I prefer to ban them outright,' said Dr Ng.
