Dave shows a more tactful way of restating my sentiments. Sorry If I
was a bit too harsh in my last post. I still feel that there are many
truly beautiful and rare fish to be had without a great deal of
difficulty. The others have to be earned and I don't see that as being
unfair. There are a lot of collectors (not the kind that catch wild
fish) out there, which is fine, but when it comes to very rare fish it's
the breeders who need access. That said I've been in the AKA since
about a year before the Chicago Convention (whenever that was) but for
the past few years I have had more pressing things to occupy my time, so
I haven't been breeding many killies. Last year I tried to acquire
Rivulus sp. Mahdia. I was told that it was a difficult fish and was not
available. Well like anyone else I was disappointed but I didn't make a
big deal about it. Several months later one of my local affiliate
members acquired the fish and had nothing but trouble with it. He was a
far better and more experienced breeder than myself so I figure I
probably would not have done any better.
Now that my fish-room is taking shape I will be breeding more fish but
I've come to realize that the really difficult fish are not as much fun
(for me at least) as the easy ones. I'm currently struggling with
Callopanchax occidentalis and even though they are beautiful I think I
like my Fp. Fallax better.
Cheers,
Chris
Christopher Graseck
Rye, NY
http://killifish.homestead.com/index.html
"Let us learn to dream, then perhaps we shall find the truth. But let us
beware of publishing our dreams before they have been put to the proof
of the waking understanding. -August Kekule-
-----Original Message-----
From: killietalk-bounces+cgraseck=optonline_net at aka.org
[mailto:killietalk-bounces+cgraseck=optonline_net at aka.org] On Behalf Of
Koran, David HQ02
Sent: Monday, May 02, 2005 11:58 AM
To: killietalk at aka_org
Subject: [Killietalk] RE: Chicken or egg or is that fish or egg?
The problem of interacting with the "newbie" is sometimes not the fault
of
the old fart but their involvement. As one stays around this hobby they
tend
to stay involved and sometimes get more involved. Most killie people
don't
just burn out, they are sort of like a super nova (and not a souped up
Chevy
either!). When the new person attends a meeting (or Convention) the old
timer is usually involved in carrying out some activity and doesn't
always
have the free time available and before long the meeting or event is
over.
Time flew for the old timer while the "newbie" felt ignored. I don't
know a
simple answer except that one has to make their presence known.
Because talk is cheap and opinions are everywhere, one can always engage
in
conversation and our "experts" are seemingly always ready to offer
advice. I
don't think most have found that to be the problem. Maybe the root of
all of
the discontent is that "newbies" find it difficult to get the fish they
want.
I got news for you, most of us find it difficult to get the fish we
want.
There is a short list of fish that one can get most anytime. Just about
everything else is in short supply and demand usually outstrips supply.
I
may be wrong but the issue comes when a breeder is distributing fish
where
demand is high. Here when deciding who gets what, the choice is most
often
made with the thought that the person selected has demonstrated an
ability to
produce killies in the first place and most likely if they reproduce and
sell
or distribute them themselves. Even though the breeder may be selling
his/her fish, if the recipient is known to produce killies then the
breeder
"assumes" it is likely they will be able to procure fish from that
individual
at some future time. I know that sounds like a stretch but I am sure
most of
us would agree that we pursue that logic.
Finally, I once again want to relate the story of the late Art Titus of
Detroit. Art got royally hacked when he got the same treatment (back
then we
only had the BNL F&E Listing)--money returned and fish sold out was the
standard answer. Art got what he could, even if it was only slightly
uncommon, bred it and then listed it for sale in the F&E Listing. Once
Art
listed killies for sale, he began to move to the "front of the line".
It
took a couple of year before Art could "shake the killie tree" but his
investment paid off.
So my advice is, as painful as it sounds and unless you have tons of
money to
outbid the world, don't show me the money but rather show me you produce
killies. Unfortunately you need to build a reputation to get what you
want,
build a network of killifish friends but most of all be patient. In
this era
of instant gratification the killifish hobby doesn't easily compute.
Dave Koran
To join the AKA see http://www.aka.org/pages/join.html
Archives are at http://fins.actwin.com/killietalk/
To join the AKA see http://www.aka.org/pages/join.html
Archives are at http://fins.actwin.com/killietalk/