Anyone heard of "aqua fixx"?

[Hybridfish7]

Some wholesaler I saw on facebook. Someone recommended them as a source for asfraci in one of the cichlid groups, so I messaged them asking about altoflava... they said they had full grown individuals available for suspiciously low prices. That's the european price. The place is allegedly based out of chicago. When I asked for pictures they sent pictures of altoflava from the french store "pisciculture estelans", and other than that they seem to have the same stock as them (different pictures ofc), so I'm wondering if they either get their fish from them if they do happen to be legit, or just aren't legit to begin with. Their facebook has been up for 3 years now.

Allegedly they ship to europe based on their comments, but I can't find anything else on them online. I saw two people downvoting a few of their posts, so I'm wondering if those people got scammed by them or something. Gonna do the classic "send a picture of the stock with the date and time" and see if they bite. If not I'm back to looking for altoflava.

 

[Joshuakahan]

Some wholesaler I saw on facebook. Someone recommended them as a source for asfraci in one of the cichlid groups, so I messaged them asking about altoflava... they said they had full grown individuals available for suspiciously low prices. That's the european price. The place is allegedly based out of chicago. When I asked for pictures they sent pictures of altoflava from the french store "pisciculture estelans", and other than that they seem to have the same stock as them (different pictures ofc), so I'm wondering if they either get their fish from them if they do happen to be legit, or just aren't legit to begin with. Their facebook has been up for 3 years now.

Allegedly they ship to europe based on their comments, but I can't find anything else on them online. I saw two people downvoting a few of their posts, so I'm wondering if those people got scammed by them or something. Gonna do the classic "send a picture of the stock with the date and time" and see if they bite. If not I'm back to looking for altoflava.

What are the payment methods they accept? Scams won’t usually accept PayPal since you’re protected

 

[Kevin@TUIC]

In the US altoflava has only ever been commercially distributed once. Ever. It was on July 13th, 2020 to be exact. I listed and sold all of the stock I had of them in less than 1 hour. My stock was supplied to me by the person who collected and bred them, Rusty Wessel. Any and all altoflava in the country (probably the globe) would have originally been from him or myself so tracing the origin back should be pretty easy. Did the group someone is offering originally come from Rusty himself, or from TUIC? This species is RARE. It is found in only one river. Ironically, that river is surrounded by rivers that have nanolutea in them... soo... one day.. well, you know where I'm going with that. but, some circle believe they are one in the same. maybe one day we can get fresh wild Rio Canaveral altos and compare them genetically to fresh nanos.

As far as the vendor goes.. well, no website, no email, no phone, no identity in the wholesale business that they are marketing themselves as.. The only way to contact them is via facebook messenger or whatapp is sketchy for any real professionally operated wholesale business. So.. I guess the only way to know is if you take the risk and send them some cash.
just a warning, their are people pawning off nanolutea as altoflava recently and at low prices that would not coincide with the costs of getting the real thing so buyer beware. If a wholesaler in the US had the real thing one would only imagine myself or Steve at the wetspot would have grabbed the whole lot. or, at the very least we woudl know the wholesaler.
some pics for fun

 

[Hybridfish7]

In the US altoflava has only ever been commercially distributed once. Ever. It was on July 13th, 2020 to be exact. I listed and sold all of the stock I had of them in less than 1 hour. My stock was supplied to me by the person who collected and bred them, Rusty Wessel. Any and all altoflava in the country (probably the globe) would have originally been from him or myself so tracing the origin back should be pretty easy. Did the group someone is offering originally come from Rusty himself, or from TUIC? This species is RARE. It is found in only one river. Ironically, that river is surrounded by rivers that have nanolutea in them... soo... one day.. well, you know where I'm going with that. but, some circle believe they are one in the same. maybe one day we can get fresh wild Rio Canaveral altos and compare them genetically to fresh nanos.

I know there's a a lot more that goes into the description of species, and a lot more under the surface in terms of genetic differences and whatnot, but I find it pretty ironic/hypocritical when people say to lump certain species based on the fact that "their populations are so localized/in close proximity to a visually similar species". I've messed around with comparing the sizes of ranges of CA cichlid species to native fish here... As small as we think the range of nanolutea is it still takes up like half of Virginia. About the same range as species like luxilus cerasinus and the like. All the random little darters that they describe based on hairs of difference, micropterus species endemic to like 3 counties in Georgia, or better yet those two species of African butterflyfish on opposite shores of the congo that look exactly the same yet have 10x more of a genetic difference from eachother than we do with chimps.

Anyway that aside, I sent my "send a picture with my name and the date" thing and they left it on read. Back to searching I guess. They were asking for Venmo or cashapp by the way.