Collecting fish where have you gone or would you like to go...

[Orthopod]

Thought I’d open a thread on this. In another thread we were taking about this. Love to hear anyones experiences or places they’d like to go.

I’ve collected in the Peruvian Amazon and loved it but my dream is the Xingu in brazil. I collected with Devon graham And Ian fuller. Heard more about Corydoras than I care to remember, lol. Freshwater Exotics is putting together a Brazil trip which I would love to go on but I’m not sure how it would be given Brazil’s restrictions.

what I collected in Peru, was packaged and shipped to me. I also picked up some additional fish at the various exporters in Iquitos.

 

[DMD123]

I have family that live in Ecuador and have visited quite a few times now. Ive never had the chance to go into the wild to catch anything but that would be quite fun.

These are all old pics Ive posted before of what little I saw of the hobby there.

The aquarium hobby down there is nothing like here. I found a store that carried tanks but the largest was only around 50-65 gallons. They were glass tanks with rounded corners and were breeder sized, around a 36" x 18" footprint for about $250. Very European looking but everything was 'JAD' brand and from China. I have not found any shops with cool fish there. They have Festae and green terrors in Ecuador and all they sell in the local shops are common little fish we all see here in the States. Then again this is probably a luxury for most.



My dentist office down there had a tank and it only had common tetras, barbs, gourami in it, looks to be a common 55 gallon built into the wall. I always get my teeth cleaned when Im down there because it is cheap. His waiting room:


On another visit he had this angel


My last trip has been about two years ago. On that one I got to stop by what was advertised as a “store”. Turned out to be a hobbyist who was looking to start custom built tanks. He was raising and selling various cichlids too.

Was cool just to see the aquarium hobby in another county. Maybe one day I might get to see something in the wild.

 

[Orthopod]

Interesting About Ecuador - Peru is likely the same way in towns that do not border the Amazon River. Iquitos borders The amazon and as such a lot of the economy depends on it ie fishing and fish exporting for the tropical fish trade . When I finished collecting, we stayed in Iquitos for 1 or 2 additional days and I must of stopped at 10 separate exporters. It was fascinating. Many had large concrete ponds combined with rows of stacked tanks of awesome fish.

separately, along what your saying about checking out what the hobby is in other countries. I have always wanted to go to fish stores in Asia (Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand) because I have been told that they get all the really high end stuff that Americans are to cheap to buy and they are willing to pay a premium. MFK posts and other forums seem to confirm this, as I often see fish posted from these area that cause me to drool all over myself.

when I was on the way to my honey moon, we stayed in London for a night and I made my wife go with me to a fish store, it was pretty amazing . Had a tank of zebra plecos and many sought after fish. The store looked like it was going to be small but it was not . It extended back into this brownstone shop pretty far and was 2 floors.

 

[DMD123]

The store with the tanks and the small pet store at the mall were both in Quito which is up in the mountains. The hobbyists I stopped in at was by my relatives in a small mountain town. Most of what he had was common stuff here, an albino oscar, green terror, African cichlids. The only interesting thing I saw were some baby oscars with very unique patterns which I had not seen before, so I am thinking these were wild caught.

I had found a website that made it look like they were fish exports but when we tried to contact them to tour, we got no answer. Seemed like an old dead web page that was still showing up.

I always enjoy watching episodes of River Monsters where Jeremy goes to a fish market and you see all kinds of fish you recognize in the hobby and they are just food fish there. Kind of morbid but I would like to see a fish market like that just once.

 

[DMD123]

@Orthopod, thought you might appreciate this with your love of rays... Not so such collection of fish just pics from a cruise vacation that included some time in the water with rays

Up close and personal with a ray, lol


Later that day we had Conch fritters... not this one, it went back into the water

As we were leaving we see, a male dolphin who had been frequenting the area. He was apparently looking mate and getting frisky with the anchor.

Got to snorkel a bit

 

[Orthopod]

@Orthopod, thought you might appreciate this with your love of rays... Not so such collection of fish just pics from a cruise vacation that included some time in the water with rays

Up close and personal with a ray, lol
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Later that day we had Conch fritters... not this one, it went back into the water
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As we were leaving we see, a male dolphin who had been frequenting the area. He was apparently looking mate and getting frisky with the anchor.
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Got to snorkel a bit
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Love it - it’s amazing how much personality the rays have. Bad rap due to Steve Irwin (rip). My big female Classic LEo actually squirts water out of the tank when she is mad that I haven’t given her enough food. She soaks the fish room which on occasion is bad enough to soak through the wall and get me in trouble with my wife, lol.

 

[sir_keith]

We did an Amazon expedition right after 9-11, with Iquitos as home base. Flew from Seattle to Dallas, then to Lima, where we spent two days. Another flight to Iquitos- 'Gateway to the Peruvian Amazon.' You can only get there by airplane or boat; no roads at all, except in the town itself, which is full of motorized rickshaws. Went to the amazing fish market- both live and dead fish- at dawn. Met up with our guide, and spent the whole day alternating between small motorboats and rickshaws, at least 6 or 7 of each in succession, as we made our way into the jungle. Spent a week exploring, just the guide and my girl and me, including amazing dawn and sunset trips to the Canopy Walkway, built by an American ecologist years ago. A walk in the jungle at midnight- phosphorescence everywhere. Back to Iquitos to board the riverboat La Amatista; 20 passengers, 18 crewmen; lots of Pisco Sours and great food, mostly fresh-caught Dourada (big, ugly catfish). Caught red-belly piranha for lunch; bony little things. All sorts of characins and beautiful angelfish in the little streams that are everywhere. Be careful where you swim.

Imported some beautiful Peruvian angelfish for my breeding project, in which I was trying to reinvigorate the black angel germline with wild-type genes. Here is a pair of my F1 progeny from crossing a wild-caught Peruvian angel female with a tank-raised black male; beautiful fishes, but no blacks until the next generation, as expected. These fishes have no 'veil-tail' genes in their pedigree; the lovely finnage comes from their wild Peruvian parent.

 

[Orthopod]

We did an Amazon expedition right after 9-11, with Iquitos as home base. Flew from Seattle to Dallas, then to Lima, where we spent two days. Another flight to Iquitos- 'Gateway to the Peruvian Amazon.' You can only get there by airplane or boat; no roads at all, except in the town itself, which is full of motorized rickshaws. Went to the amazing fish market- both live and dead fish- at dawn. Met up with our guide, and spent the whole day alternating between small motorboats and rickshaws, at least 6 or 7 of each in succession, as we made our way into the jungle. Spent a week exploring, just the guide and my girl and me, including amazing dawn and sunset trips to the Canopy Walkway, built by an American ecologist years ago. A walk in the jungle at midnight- phosphorescence everywhere. Back to Iquitos to board the riverboat La Amatista; 20 passengers, 18 crewmen; lots of Pisco Sours and great food, mostly fresh-caught Dourada (big, ugly catfish). Caught red-belly piranha for lunch; bony little things. All sorts of characins and beautiful angelfish in the little streams that are everywhere. Be careful where you swim.

Imported some beautiful Peruvian angelfish for my breeding project, in which I was trying to reinvigorate the black angel germline with wild-type genes. Here is a pair of my F1 progeny from crossing a wild-caught Peruvian angel female with a tank-raised black male; beautiful fishes, but no blacks until the next generation, as expected. These fishes have no 'veil-tail' genes in their pedigree; the lovely finnage comes from their wild Peruvian parent.

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Sounds like we had similar trips - I also went out of Iquitos. Did you go with Devon Graham who runs project Amazona. Also forgot about the pisco sours until you mentioned it.

for those of you interested in a guided fish collection trip to the amazon - here you go. Devon is great. Wish I knew then what I know now - I would of come back with so many more cool fish lol .

there was a stingray A species That we caught that I have never seen in the trade. It had a 4 foot whip tail. I would have brought that back. I would have bright back angels, more apistos, more pIke cichlids, peacock bass, Geos.

I didn’t appreciate as many fish when I went as I do now. That trip gave me 1st taste of stingrays as I caught several I brought back . Also, gave my 1st appreciation of apistos and killis. I brought back a few but would have brought back a bunch more if I did it now, lol .

Looking back on that trip, I did a lot of things with reckless abandon that I may not be able to do now. I waded into obvious Electric Eel havens and swam everywhere with out a care in the world. Having little ones that you have to provide for makes the Decision process slightly different, lol. That being said, there was an 80 year old naturalist on the boat. She didn’t go on any of the day trips or excursions though.

Ian fuller, the cori guru, (had no idea who he was at the time) and his buds were on the trip. He gave me a pleco hat that I still have to this day, lol.


http://www.mtamazon.com/amazon-fish-collecting-1

 

[sir_keith]

How on earth could you ever forget the Pisco Sours! One of the highlights of the trip!




We visited several Riberenos ('River People') villages along the river bank. No plumbing, no electricity, no contact with the outside world except for visitors traveling down the Amazon. Each village had maybe 200 people subsisting on slash-and-burn agriculture. Average lifespan- 34 years. Main cause of death- snakebites. A different world.

 

[Orthopod]

How on earth could you ever forget the Pisco Sours! One of the highlights of the

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We visited several Riberenos ('River People') villages along the river bank. No plumbing, no electricity, no contact with the outside world except for visitors traveling down the Amazon. Each village had maybe 200 people subsisting on slash-and-burn agriculture. Average lifespan- 34 years. Main cause of death- snakebites. A different world.

.


I remember the villages as well - several of the villagers would guide us to bodies of water where we would catch fish. I remember one stream they took us to that they warned us about the candiru species that swims up the urethra, lol. That was uncomfortable To wade into lol.

I also recall the cetopsid catfish which I wasn’t aware of until going down - they are worse than pirhannas and take a Cookie cutter bite out to Everything.