Hey guys,
Just as an introduction, Queensland Aquarium Forum (aka QLDAF, http://www.qldaf.com) has had a trip to Bayfish organized for a select number of their members to participate in, which happened on Monday the 7th of July. For those lucky enough to be a member of this forum and be involved in the trip and the following proceedings, this was a huge day out with a guided tour and demonstrations at Bayfish itself, followed by a Rep filled store back at the place that organized it all for us, free of charge, Redlands Pet Centre at Capalaba. We were given speeches from some of the top of the line brands reps, such as Eheim, API, AquaOne, Pet Pacific (Importers of API, Fluval, Hagen), and AquarWorld.
For those who don't know, Bayfish is Australia's largest aquarium and decorative fish importer and supplier, supplying most major fish stores throughout the country.
65 of us were lucky enough to make the trip to Bayfish for the tour, where we were given a full demonstration of all of Eheim's best products and a tour of the facility as well as a free lunch. From there, we returned to Redlands Pet Centre where there the API, AquaOne, AquarWorld and Pet Pacific reps were present, who gave us demonstrations and explanations of many products, as well as a big raffle, with a Phillips Home DVD Theatre System, AquarWorld 1300 Lph Canister, and AquaOne CF2400 Canister as the major prizes, and 60 300W Aquarworld Heaters to be handed out, and everyone got one. Prices were also ridiculous; as an example, all 4 of the Fluval FX5's going out the door at a staggering $350 with free media, and they definitely weren't the cheapest products on offer.
I personally picked up a 300W Jager Heater, AquaOne Digital Thermometer w/ Probe, an API gH/kH Liquid Kit, and 1L of JBL MicroMec Biomedia, which was demonstrated on the day and seems a vary competitive product to the better know EHFI and Seachem Matrix media. I also ended up with my free 300W AquarWorld Heater, and a bunch of treats that came in our free AquaOne showbag, including a free net, glass thermometer, Australian Aquarium Magazine, a few AquaOne food samples, and a bunch of other little random things.
Was a great day out, thanks to Russ from Redlands Pet Centre for organizing it and everyone involved, including all the forum members and their partners/friends that attended, as well as the staff from Bayfish, Aquatopia, API, AquaOne, AquarWorld, etc. I think everyone was looking forward to the social aspect of this, and as a quite closely knit community it was great to put a face to a username.
Myself and another forum member, wonna, who made the trip down from Rockhampton for the day and stayed with me were official photographers for the day. Here are collaboration of shots we took throughout the day in a pretty decent order of how they occured.
Bus trip to Bayfish, featuring Russ (turned around) who organised everything today.
Arriving at Bayfish.
Nick and Brian after bus exit. These guys are pretty popular forum participants.
Bayfish Owner/CEO Nathan Patrick and Russ addressing us as we arrived. He covered how the business operates, where and how stock is imported and then sent to shops, as well as explaining certain issues such as fish losses due to stress and other problems they have. He also answered a bunch of questions that we threw at him.
Nathan pointing at stuff while he delivered his introduction.
Rough idea of how big one of the two buildings are at the Bayfish centre. This is the main fish room building, with another large storage warehouse (roughly 80x40M) located behind it for Dry Goods.
Aquatopia/Eheim Representative and Salesman Jason Dean introducing us to some Eheim products, including the Pickup Internal, Classic Series Canisters, the amazing Eheim Professional 3E, and of course, Jager heaters.
Run down on the Pro 3E. This canister is absolutely top of the market.
Using the force to sell Jager heaters.
Packing station where fish are bagged and sorted. Because of the mass volume of orders that Bayfish need to fill, they're separated on the line with blocks of wood that have small whiteboard sections attached with the business name/address.
Peter inspecting the oxygen and bagging setup. Employees would quickly fill the bags with Oxygen and then use an automatic metal clamping system to seal the bags.
Peter further inspecting the fish on the way out, with a Bayfish Employee making sure the orders are correct.
Lots of polystyrene boxes.
Inspector reeco checking out some of the bagged fish.
Full lunch provided by Bayfish.
Bit of the second building, Bayfish's warehouse. Expensive Arcadia pallets.
Filtration room. I have absolutely no technical data on this but it was quite large as you can see.
People checking out the Saratoga in one of the sumps. There is apparently also a very large Mangrove Jack and a Murray Cod in the various large sumps.
Big towers with rotating spray bars that appeared to be Wet/Dry setups.
Goldfish/Koi/Comet/etc. room, we didn't go in here because no one was really interested.
The real fish room, Cichlids and Catfish. Hard to photograph because it's absolutely massive. 1800 4 foot setups we were told.
Americans. Most of the QLDAF members are African keepers but there's a handful of dedicated American keepers like myself out there.
Nathan giving us a quick run down on the fish setups, how Bayfish employees know where to find fish and such. Also explained the Quarantine times and process.
Quarantine, off limits to everyone unfortunately.
Big tub of water from the system that they used for filling buckets to select and pack fish.
Some very nice Frontosa's, the first photo are Wild caught imports.
L104 Clown Plecostomus (Panaque maccus)
Neetroplus', not an overly common American cichlid.
Mystus vittatus pileup.
Really nicely coloured little Apistogramma cacatuoides (Red).
Back at the shop with everything set up, awesome job by Russ and his stuff.
Patrick Durkin, Asia-Pacific Manager of API Aquarium Pharmaceuticals (Now known as Mars FishCare) introducing us to and explaining the API range of products from their test kits to stress coats and conditioners.
Some of the incredible pieces of driftwood on offer, so large. Cheap too but these guys would have trouble even fitting into my tank.
Russ organising us for the Giveaways!
Ironmonkey stealing (winning) the Phillips Home Theatre/DVD setup.
Jonoz taking away the 2400Lph AquaOne canister, he was stealthy and this is the best shot we got.
Reeco (Ree-Ko) warming our hearts with his happiness when he took away the nice 1300lph AquarWorld canister.
Bad shot with the Aquarworld rep.
Our loot on the way home north, couple of FX5's, Eheim Classic and a bunch of other stuff. Frontosa_mad being a dork.
Was a fantastic day out. Plugs might be looked down upon, but if you're actually from Australia and in Brisbane, head over to Redlands Pet Center at Capalaba, it's an excellent store and I can vouch first hand for their great standard prices and fish quality. Russ has personally guided me around their filtration room and setup and it's absolutely top notch.
Cheers guys, hopefully this gives people a slight insight to what fish suppliers are like.
Just as an introduction, Queensland Aquarium Forum (aka QLDAF, http://www.qldaf.com) has had a trip to Bayfish organized for a select number of their members to participate in, which happened on Monday the 7th of July. For those lucky enough to be a member of this forum and be involved in the trip and the following proceedings, this was a huge day out with a guided tour and demonstrations at Bayfish itself, followed by a Rep filled store back at the place that organized it all for us, free of charge, Redlands Pet Centre at Capalaba. We were given speeches from some of the top of the line brands reps, such as Eheim, API, AquaOne, Pet Pacific (Importers of API, Fluval, Hagen), and AquarWorld.
For those who don't know, Bayfish is Australia's largest aquarium and decorative fish importer and supplier, supplying most major fish stores throughout the country.
65 of us were lucky enough to make the trip to Bayfish for the tour, where we were given a full demonstration of all of Eheim's best products and a tour of the facility as well as a free lunch. From there, we returned to Redlands Pet Centre where there the API, AquaOne, AquarWorld and Pet Pacific reps were present, who gave us demonstrations and explanations of many products, as well as a big raffle, with a Phillips Home DVD Theatre System, AquarWorld 1300 Lph Canister, and AquaOne CF2400 Canister as the major prizes, and 60 300W Aquarworld Heaters to be handed out, and everyone got one. Prices were also ridiculous; as an example, all 4 of the Fluval FX5's going out the door at a staggering $350 with free media, and they definitely weren't the cheapest products on offer.
I personally picked up a 300W Jager Heater, AquaOne Digital Thermometer w/ Probe, an API gH/kH Liquid Kit, and 1L of JBL MicroMec Biomedia, which was demonstrated on the day and seems a vary competitive product to the better know EHFI and Seachem Matrix media. I also ended up with my free 300W AquarWorld Heater, and a bunch of treats that came in our free AquaOne showbag, including a free net, glass thermometer, Australian Aquarium Magazine, a few AquaOne food samples, and a bunch of other little random things.
Was a great day out, thanks to Russ from Redlands Pet Centre for organizing it and everyone involved, including all the forum members and their partners/friends that attended, as well as the staff from Bayfish, Aquatopia, API, AquaOne, AquarWorld, etc. I think everyone was looking forward to the social aspect of this, and as a quite closely knit community it was great to put a face to a username.
Myself and another forum member, wonna, who made the trip down from Rockhampton for the day and stayed with me were official photographers for the day. Here are collaboration of shots we took throughout the day in a pretty decent order of how they occured.
Bus trip to Bayfish, featuring Russ (turned around) who organised everything today.
Arriving at Bayfish.
Nick and Brian after bus exit. These guys are pretty popular forum participants.
Bayfish Owner/CEO Nathan Patrick and Russ addressing us as we arrived. He covered how the business operates, where and how stock is imported and then sent to shops, as well as explaining certain issues such as fish losses due to stress and other problems they have. He also answered a bunch of questions that we threw at him.
Nathan pointing at stuff while he delivered his introduction.
Rough idea of how big one of the two buildings are at the Bayfish centre. This is the main fish room building, with another large storage warehouse (roughly 80x40M) located behind it for Dry Goods.
Aquatopia/Eheim Representative and Salesman Jason Dean introducing us to some Eheim products, including the Pickup Internal, Classic Series Canisters, the amazing Eheim Professional 3E, and of course, Jager heaters.
Run down on the Pro 3E. This canister is absolutely top of the market.
Using the force to sell Jager heaters.
Packing station where fish are bagged and sorted. Because of the mass volume of orders that Bayfish need to fill, they're separated on the line with blocks of wood that have small whiteboard sections attached with the business name/address.
Peter inspecting the oxygen and bagging setup. Employees would quickly fill the bags with Oxygen and then use an automatic metal clamping system to seal the bags.
Peter further inspecting the fish on the way out, with a Bayfish Employee making sure the orders are correct.
Lots of polystyrene boxes.
Inspector reeco checking out some of the bagged fish.
Full lunch provided by Bayfish.
Bit of the second building, Bayfish's warehouse. Expensive Arcadia pallets.
Filtration room. I have absolutely no technical data on this but it was quite large as you can see.
People checking out the Saratoga in one of the sumps. There is apparently also a very large Mangrove Jack and a Murray Cod in the various large sumps.
Big towers with rotating spray bars that appeared to be Wet/Dry setups.
Goldfish/Koi/Comet/etc. room, we didn't go in here because no one was really interested.
The real fish room, Cichlids and Catfish. Hard to photograph because it's absolutely massive. 1800 4 foot setups we were told.
Americans. Most of the QLDAF members are African keepers but there's a handful of dedicated American keepers like myself out there.
Nathan giving us a quick run down on the fish setups, how Bayfish employees know where to find fish and such. Also explained the Quarantine times and process.
Quarantine, off limits to everyone unfortunately.
Big tub of water from the system that they used for filling buckets to select and pack fish.
Some very nice Frontosa's, the first photo are Wild caught imports.
L104 Clown Plecostomus (Panaque maccus)
Neetroplus', not an overly common American cichlid.
Mystus vittatus pileup.
Really nicely coloured little Apistogramma cacatuoides (Red).
Back at the shop with everything set up, awesome job by Russ and his stuff.
Patrick Durkin, Asia-Pacific Manager of API Aquarium Pharmaceuticals (Now known as Mars FishCare) introducing us to and explaining the API range of products from their test kits to stress coats and conditioners.
Some of the incredible pieces of driftwood on offer, so large. Cheap too but these guys would have trouble even fitting into my tank.
Russ organising us for the Giveaways!
Ironmonkey stealing (winning) the Phillips Home Theatre/DVD setup.
Jonoz taking away the 2400Lph AquaOne canister, he was stealthy and this is the best shot we got.
Reeco (Ree-Ko) warming our hearts with his happiness when he took away the nice 1300lph AquarWorld canister.
Bad shot with the Aquarworld rep.
Our loot on the way home north, couple of FX5's, Eheim Classic and a bunch of other stuff. Frontosa_mad being a dork.
Was a fantastic day out. Plugs might be looked down upon, but if you're actually from Australia and in Brisbane, head over to Redlands Pet Center at Capalaba, it's an excellent store and I can vouch first hand for their great standard prices and fish quality. Russ has personally guided me around their filtration room and setup and it's absolutely top notch.
Cheers guys, hopefully this gives people a slight insight to what fish suppliers are like.
And where are the beast New World cichlids at?
