A article about me and my Goodeids
British livebearer Association 2012
.A Visit to a Goodeid Paradise (in a Shed)
by Paddy Davies
Gary Randall is a well known hobbyist having been keeping fish for since 1978, and he has specialised in Goodeids for X of them. Like many, he started with a goldfish won at the local fairground. However, it wasn't long before he got bored of the goldfish and I wanted to move onto Topical fish, setting up a small fish room containing a 8, 3ft tanks he kept and bred a number of different cichlids, also keeping common swordtails and guppies, soon he had specialised in live-bearers. By the mid 80’s the number of fish tanks had grown to 60 , 30 tanks in-side the house and 30 tanks outside in the shed. A house extension gave extra room so all the tanks and livebeares in one place.
10 years ago Gary decided that he wanted more fish tanks so built a fish house/shed outside, giving him the space for more tanks and also allowing more space to keep and breed all the different types of live foods that’s important to maintain goodeied in good health.
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Gary's first goodeied was X.eiseni, when visiting a local fish shop in the 80's he was fascinated by their shape and colour that he had to buy some , followed fairly quickly by Ameca splen-dens, 1992 saw Gary join his first fish club and visited lots of fish shows, meeting many fish keepers and and gaining contacts both in the uk and around the world.
Gary has kept most of the goodeids long term and taken many years to build up his collection of 50 species/populations of goodeids this would not of been possi-ble without the help of many friends and dedicated fish keepers,
I had been looking forward to seeing his fishroom properly as last time I visited I was in a hurry and did not get a good look around. First the stats, this is Gary's 4th fish house, the first one was a small but well designed on just off the kitchen, however it was also the main route to the bathroom, as you can imagine this com-bination of fishroom/corridor really had to change. So the shed was comman-deered and is much more suitable, apart from having to go outside on cold winter evenings. The family prefer it as well as they were getting a bit fed up of the sweet smell of microworm cultures!
There are 120 tanks in his fish house, more than many Aquarium shops. There are over 50 separate populations of Goodeids, a few Poecilids and a few other types of fish he has picked up here and there. Also as you walk about you can discover his dirty secret – a love of guppies, they are everywhere.
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The space is tight, the tanks are laid out in two aisles with a row of tanks in be-tween. The aisles are only about 6 foot high and 18 inches to 2 foot wide, how-ever the tanks are religiously maintained and brimming with fish. An air pump and air powered filters are used, many of these are basic home made gravel filled units, basic maybe, but there is no doubt they do the job perfectly. Water changes are performed weekly
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Characodon audax 'el toboso'
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Male Xenotoca melanosma
With so many fish, it is impossible to notice all pregnant females and to save all fry, for this reason Gary will observe his colonies regularly and give special atten-tion to ensuring that each consists of a good mix of ages and sexes. He has a very good record of maintaining species for many years, often species become briefly popular and then disappear a few years later, Gary is one of those people who ensures it does not disappear from the hobby.
If you are into Goodeids this is an Aladdin’s cave with representatives of the following Genera being kept;
Allodonticthys
Ataeniobius
Allophorus
Allotoca
Ameca Characodon
Chapalicthys
Goodea
Giradinicthys
Illyodon
Skiffia
Xenotoca
Xenophorus
Xenotaenia
Zoogeneticus
This fish house is home to several very rare fish, for me this was the first time I had seen Albino Chapalicthys encaustus and Allodonticthys hubbsi.
I would like to thank Gary for the invitation to his fish house, the coffee and for freely giving up his time to answer my endless questions.
