earthfish said:
I am looking for reasons to join!
I guess I just want to hear some opinions. I need people who are members to tell me why to join PM me or comment
Hi earthfish,
I believe in full disclosure: I am the current president of the Greater Seattle Aquarium Society (GSAS).
I think you ask a very relevant question: "Why should I join GSAS?"
I see a lot of my fellow GSAS members and some of our previous guests at meetings have already given you some of the better reasons but let my explain what I like about GSAS. (BTW, I only joined 5 years ago).
The Greater Seattle Aquarium Society (GSAS) is a local club dedicated to promoting our hobby with emphasis on freshwater species. In order to preserve the 'local flavor' of our club the GSAS Board decided that membership should limited to Washington State residents or out of state individuals that have actually attended a meeting - we have no desire to be a "national club". Our membership dues is low, the cost for a 12 month family membership is $20 (single $15) and we have maintained that price for over 10 years. Currently GSAS has 250 members; our membership has tripled in the last few years. Typically we have about 70 - 80 members and guests attend our monthly meetings. GSAS is a registered non-profit corporation in the State of Washington.
Our members enjoy several benefits: discounts of 5%-20% (average 10% - 15%) at our Sponsor Stores* (LFS - no big-box stores); 10 monthly meetings per year (we take July & August off) with local, national, and international speakers**. If the speakers allow it, we video the presentations and make them available to our members either on DVD through our Library or sometimes via Bittorent as well. I believe we currently have 25 downloadable videos available to our members online and probably 100 or more presentations on DVD in our GSAS Library. Sometimes our speakers will do two talks for us, our regular meeting which is open to the public and a 'Member's Only' meeting; some of the 'Member's Only' meetings do occur on the weekend.
Speaking of our Library, we have an extensive collection of aquarium books and DVD's (some Blu-Ray/HD) available for our members to check out. We also have a club summer picnic and our December meeting is our Holiday Party. We have an e-mail chat called 'airstone' that is very active with about 1000 messages a month.
GSAS has a monthly newsletter, Northwest Aquaria. In it there are articles by our members about spawning fish, growing plants, and DIY projects for making our hobby more fun and easy. We have approximately 40 years of back issues available online to our members.
We do have a Breeders Award Program (BAP) and a Horticulture Awards Program (HAP) and bowl shows. We are aware of the C.A.R.E.S. project and several of our members are trustees of endangered species. Our club has a very active Philanthropy Committee where we attempt to put two or more aquariums into classrooms every year as teaching tools for teachers. We have our annual GSAS Home Show where a video crew, photographer, and judges visit about a dozen members' homes and video they tanks, fishrooms, ponds, etc.
GSAS has two major auctions a year; our General Auction (April 13th) and our Plant Auction in November. In addition GSAS has a 'mini-auction' after every regular meeting (except Christmas) where members can bring items to sell (anyone including guests can buy). This is a great way to get rid of those 'extra' fry and plants and pick up new species to try!
You can go to our website, GSAS.org to sign up. Click on the 'Join' tab at the top of the page and you can either print off the membership forum, fill it out, and mail it in with your payment or in the upper right hand corner you can join using PayPal.*** As of 3/27/13 PayPal is having some "issues" processing payments for us (thank you for reporting it BillHN) so payment via check is the recommended method until PayPal resolves their issues.
I know I am forgetting a lot of what we do at GSAS but if you have additional questions just ask!
Thanks,
-Roy
* GSAS Sponsor Stores include:
A Place for Pets
Aquarist World
B&I Pet Center
Conway Tropical Fish
Denny's Pet World
The Fish Store
King's Discus
Liem's Aquarium and Bird Shop
Midway Tropical Fish and Pet
Sierra Fish and Pets
(two or three more are expected to be added this year)
** Speakers in the last three years have been:
Ad Konings - Lake Tanganyika Sand Dwellers
Ghazanfar Ghori - Cryptocorynes
Luis Narvarro - Aquascaping
Karen Randall - AGA - Aquascaping
Tom Barr - Light for Planted Aquariums
Barbie Fiorentio - Loricariis and Plecos
Oliver Lucanus - Biotopes of the Amazon
Dick Au - Discus Basics
Gary Lange - Rainbowfishes
Chuck Rambo - Rare and Unusual Dwarf Cichlids
Chuck Rambo - Lake Victoria and its Cichlids
Allen Fertuna - Fancy Goldfish
Dick Au - Raising Fish for Fun and Profit
Dick Au - Angelfish Breeding
Matt Kaufman - Keeping and enjoying Killifish
Christel Kasselmann - New and Unusual Aquarium Plants
Waylon Pon - Freshwater Shrimp for Dummies
Lawrence Kent - Cichlids of East Africa - Beyond the Big Three Rift Lakes
Ted Judy - Pelvicachromis
Ted Judy - Raising Fry