Ebay Fish Ban

For years thousands of fish have been sold on ebay each month, with many large sellers seeing hundreds or thousands of sales per month.

But a quick look through the listings and you can see issues. One seller offers 4 polar parrots for just over £25 with free delivery, via Royal Mail no less. They describe them as peaceful and ideal for a community aquarium, with no mention of water requirements, potential aggression, or other requirements.

In the description they outline that if you’re not in to receive the delivery, or that your PayPal address is wrong, then they’re not responsible.

So let me get this straight, they are sending out illegally via Royal Mail, who states that they will not carry live animals, potentially to the wrong address, with no contingency plan if the delivery is delayed. The regulations covering the sale of animals as pets, including fish, state that the seller has to ensure the buyer is able to take care fo their new pet. This seller isn’t even checking if the person has given the the correct address, never mind if they have a tank.

This was one of many, another listing by a different seller offered 4 paradise fish as being peaceful, hassle free, and ideal for children, red tail cat/ tiger shovel noses sold with no information in the listing, never mind pointing out that these will get to a couple of feet long in 18 months or less, a listing for 6 assorted parrots, all dyed, a cruel practise that is outlawed here, but for some reason is fine as long as it’s done in another country.

There are many fantastic sellers on eBay, but there are some awful examples that make me fear for the future of the hobby itself.

So as you can tell I’m not a great fan of live animals being sold on a site like they’re a second hand coat, or cheap fidget spinner. Internet sales have their place, but sellers have to do the same checks as a reputable shop would. Notice I said reputable, I’m aware some shops are also letting the side down.

Yesterday (19th Feb 2025) the eBay guidelines updated to say that they are banning the sale of vertebrates and most invertebrates on their platform. A quick look this morning showed me there are over 15 000 listings for live fish alone on there, so this isn’t a few small sellers. Sellers themselves have received emails telling them to edit or remove listings that breach these new rules.

What can you do?

If you are an occasional seller of a small number of fish then there are plenty of options. Online we have Aquarist Classified, Pets4Homes, Preloved and a whole host more.

But I’d encourage you to see if there is a fish club local to you, I’m going to try and get a list on this website in the next week or so.

Chat with your local fish shop, many independents will work with home breeders. I know that several shops have taken fish off me when my shoals have increased in size beyond what I wanted.

Also talk to other fish keepers. Most of my present fish have come from friends that either wanted to move on fish, or had recent success in breeding.

If you are a shop or other business then I would push you to have your own website. If you already do then market that. There is help out there, and Turtle and Heron Media are offering 50% off for anyone wanting an ecommerce site, a simple webpage, or marketing.

There will be a rush of people creating sites to cater for this. But so many of these will come and go, with your own website you have control, and your time and effort isn’t lost if the person creating the new site runs out of money or gets bored.