Meeting Notes

August, 2010

Speaker: Tony Orso, "Asian Fish"

45 people present
129 items in the Auction

Tony and Rose Orso came down from New Jersey for the weekend. Tony’s talk on "Asian Fishes" centered on rasboras, barbs, dwarf barbs, botias, loaches, gobies, danios, white clouds, half beaks, puffers, and other assorted Asian freshwater fishes.

Rasboras:

Dario hysginom: cave spawners
Badis badis: many are treated poorly and arrive improperly packaged, and stored in the wrong water. Peat is not needed.
Dario dario: no color on the female
Dario hysginon: beautiful red cave breeder

Dario dario   (Source: www.diewasserwelt.de/60.htm)

Barbs:

Barbus padamya: wild caught species look better
b. manipurensis: large, not common
b. gelius: dwarf, shipped out of India. Indian barbs are often undercared for and over packed. Singapore is buying from India.

Dwarf Barbs: Hexazona pentazona is not popular in the US, but a nice colorful fish. Rhombocellatus: a fat pentazonas. Tony says to try to get small ones because the large ones often have bacterial infections. Try for 1 to 1.25 inch size.
Tiantian: silver with large black spots.
Cosuatus: N. Burma
Crenicoides: Most elegant fish.
Barilius bernatziki: Blue hillstream trout. They are jumpers and in constant motion.
B. dogarsinghi: Tank bullies.

Barbus denisonii   (Source: www.petshop-zoomania.com/Barbus%20fishes/Barbus%20Denisonii%201.jpg)

Botias, Loaches and Gobies:

Botias are good shipped out of the wild.

Botia Kubotai: Out of Burma, spotted botias
B. histrionica: Variable colored fish
B. udomritthiruji: price has fallen, 4.5 inch fish
B. splendida: Worth the money.
b. nigrolineata: "A gorgeous animal." fish is black on snow white. Tony feels that is it the nicest loach out there.
b. striata: nice price, attractive, well behaved loach.
Serpenticobitis octazona: another beautiful animal. Tony says, "The specialty guys in Singapore can get triple cost on these."
Schistura balteata: terrorizes the tank
s. pridii: "dragon loach", gets 1.25 inches
Yunnanilus cruciatus: Vientam

Serpenticobitis octozona loach   Source: forums.loaches.com/viewtopic.php?t=20689&sid=a90be00c9ee0ac668e7018545d6b26cd

Danios/Devarios:

Tony said that the expensive danios are produced in tanks, but that the "junk" fish are bred in vats. He commented that Indonesia has come a long way and that consolidators for local breeders have done a lot for the quality of the fish being shipped.

Sundadanio axelrodi: blue, red, green
D. erythromicron: an alkaline water fish
D. margaitus: beautiful!
D. Dangilla: nice barbells
D. shanensis
D. chrsotaeniatus: beautiful fish
D. hikarii
D. Tinwini and D. guagga: described last year.
Danioonella mirifica: transluscent scaleless and colorless. Not great shippers.
Devario auropurpureus: great color when they settle in.
Danio roseus: aka: "Purple Passion" danio in Florida
Devario Sondhiri: commonly raised in closed facilities in Florida

danio margaritatus
(Source: www.aquaticquotient.com/forum/showthread.php/23742-Danio-margaritatus-(formerly-known-as-Celestichthys-margaritatus)

White Clouds:

Tanichthus Albonus: from the WuTong Mountain Stream in Vietnam

Half Beaks:

Indonesia. They require work and need absolutely sterile conditions. They come from peat swamps where the acid water keeps bacteria at bay.

Aura and pulcher commonly come in. They eat live food. Tony said, "If it moves, they will eat it. They’re stupid."
Hemirhamphodon crysopunctatus: very cool, but tempermental
H. phaisoma
H. kuekenthal: the blue line halfbeak. Absolutely beautiful fish. Tony suggests to condition the fish with live food.

Puffers:

Monotrete baileyi: no aggression, bottom dweller, 5 inch fish. Tony said, "They do nothing."
Carinotetraodon irrubesco: dwarf puffer
C. lorteti
C. salivator
Auriglobus nefastus: dwarf green puffer. They are tail biters.
Tetradon suvattii: Pig nose puffer from Bankok. They are not aggressive, but will kill if there are only two of them. Better in groups.
Carinotetraodon borneensis: Black Borneo Puffer. Tony said it is not really black, however.

Dasyatis laosensis, Asian Ray   Source: th.wikipedia.org/wiki/

Assorted Fishes:

Garra poecilura: New
G. flavatra: Rainbow Garra. Eats algae, gets nice and big, "a great fish"
Dasyatis Laosensis: Asian Rays

Cichlids:

Etroplus Canarensis: from India, was widely available, but now the price is high.

Note: Please pardon misspelled species names. Typically our speakers go very fast through their presentations. The note-taker tries to get every name spelled correctly in her notebook, but mistakes are bound to happen. Please pardon the note-taker if you see anything out of order or misspelled. Thank you.

Submitted by Sherry Mitchell