Hi I'm looking to start my own business eventually named family aquatics I'm just trying to learn as much information as I can about fresh water fish

[Family Aquatics]

Oscars
Neon tetras
Glo fish
Guppies
Shrimp
Betta fish
Tetras in general
So basically all of the fresh water fish

 

[Family Aquatics]

And how to breed fish also

 

[Fishmanic]

Welcome to TFF. We have lots of knowledgeable members here to answer any questions you may have.
Show us some pics of your present Fish and your tanks.
Hope you enter our Tank of the Month contests and also Fish of the Month and Pet of the Month.

 

[Lajos_Detari]

Welcome!
For running/operating a fish shop, fish issues, @Colin_T is the most qualified to advise you.
There are also others who have many years of experience who can advise you about fish/fish species.

But before you start a business, you may want to do a survey of your place...
Are there many young people who are willing to keep pets?
Keeping fish are not cheap.
So, you may want to find out the purchasing power of the people who live in your area.

You may want to promote/advertise and provide awareness to people in your area about fish keeping...

Calculate your operation costs, profits, etc..
Look for reliable and cheaper sources of fish from your country or overseas and get their support.
You will need to get support from them and learn more about how to keep the fish

Provide as much information as possible to get people interested in fish keeping through the media, brochures, etc..
Knowing about the fish, shrimps, lobster/crayfish, crabs, their background, origin, behaviors, etc will get people interested in them...

Provide information about the different rivers system in the world...
South America - Amazon, Orinoco, Pantanal, Negro rivers, etc...
Africa - Lake Malawi, Tanganyika, Victoria, etc.
Asian, Australian, Central America, North America rivers,...many more.

You can also promote aquascaping to attract people.
Get someone to do some road shows to promote aquascaping...

Read as much as possible from reliable sources about the fish, shrimps, crabs, lobsters species, etc...
Seriously Fish website provides reliable information about fish.

Astronotus ocellatus – Oscar (Lobotes ocellatus, Astronotus orbiculatus) — Seriously Fish

www.seriouslyfish.com

You will need to know all about the fish requirements - water pH, GH, KH; starting a tank, tank setup and
especially Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate issues, fish diseases, and many more...

Find out what are the fish that are commonly bought by most people (eg. Guppies, Neon Tetras, etc). Focus on these fish.

Whenever you sell fish, you must also sell other stuff like fish tanks, fish food, filters, accessories, water conditioners, medications, sand, rocks, driftwoods, lightings, etc.. to support the fish keeping hobby...
Sometimes I feel that if you carry many "affordable" tanks, more people will buy them and in return, they will buy more fish...

Don't carry too many high end products that will turn people away from buying them because of their prices...
Asian/Chinese brands products are a few times cheaper than the American/European brands...

Also, don't carry too many expensive fish or fish that are not hardy. You will lose money when the fish die...
In fact, I saw some fish shops that carry only cheaper fish and only 1-2 types of expensive fish...

I'm not a businessman but I visit fish shops almost every week, and sometimes almost everyday and I observed which shops have more customers and what the customers buy most of the time... There are more than 10 fish shops near to my house, or within 15-20mins drive away...

Let us know if you have more questions especially about the brands of products, fish food, etc....

Some links which you might be interested...

BIN Archive – BAP

biotopeaquariumproject.com

Getting Started with Aquascaping - Aquascaping Love

Getting started with aquascaping is not difficult. Like any other passion, it takes time, dedication and extensive research.

aquascapinglove.com

A Guide for Keeping Freshwater Shrimp

Written by: Tammy (@aquarist_tl) and Team Buce Plant When most people think of aquariums, they expect to find fish living in them, but there is actually a vast amount of hobbyists that maintain shrimp-only tanks. There are also those that have tanks with both shrimp and fish cohabitating with...

buceplant.com

 

[Fishmanic]

What is your present experience with fish keeping? What fish and tanks do you presently have?

 

[Colin_T]

Back to Basics when Breeding Fish

STARTING OUT Make sure you have a pair, (1 male + 1 female). There is nothing worse than spending your hard-earned dollars buying a couple of fish to try and breed and ending up with a pair of fish of the same sex. Let's face it, to reproduce fish you need a male and a female. Two males won't do...

www.fishforums.net

Most tetras need soft acidic water to successfully breed and for the eggs to develop and hatch. The GH and KH should be as close to 0ppm as possible and the pH below 7.0. They also breed more readily and successfully if you have tannins in the water. Tannins are the brown stain that occurs in water with driftwood and you get tannins when you put a tea bag in a cup of hot water for a cup of tea. Tannins are beneficial to fish and help reduce bacteria and fungus in the water.

Tetra eggs are sensitive to light and you don't have a light over their breeding tank. The tank has black card on the back and sides and after the fish have bred, you remove the adults and put some black card on the front of the tank. The tank is kept dark until the eggs have hatched and the fry (baby fish) start swimming. Then you can remove the card and start letting light into the aquarium.

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Most barbs are easy to breed and will breed in soft water (GH between 0-100ppm) with a pH around 6.5-7.5. They don't need anything special, just clean water and some fine leaf plants like Java Moss. Separate males and females for 5-7 days and then put a pr (1 male & 1 female) into a 2 foot tank with some Java Moss over half the bottom. Leave the adults in there for 24 hours and then remove them. The same is done with tetras. You know when they can be removed from the breeding tank because the females will be skinny instead of fat and the males won't be displaying to them anymore. Displaying is where the males flare out their fins and show off to the female.

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Rasboras are similar to barbs but like the pH to be below 7.0 and the GH below 50ppm (as close to 0ppm as possible). Some rasboras scatter eggs among fine leaf plants and others lay their eggs on plant leaves.

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Corydoras catfish should be kept in groups of 6-10 (preferably 10 or more). When they are mature and the females full of eggs, you do a 75-90% water change every day for a few days to a week. Refill the tank with water that is colder than the aquarium water. This simulates rainfall and the fish usually breed after one or two big water changes. If the adults are well fed they normally ignore the eggs and young. Most people breeding Corydoras will remove the adults after they have bred.

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Rainbowfish are bred like barbs but you only separate males and females for 5 days otherwise the females breed with each other and shed their eggs. Most rainbowfish do best in water with a pH above 7.0 and a GH above 100ppm (around 150-250ppm). Rainbowfish will lay eggs every day and a lot of breeders use spawning mops and leave the adults set up in a tank and simply swap the mops over every day or so. You can also pick the eggs out of the mops.

Iriatherina werneri and Rhadinocentrus ornatus are varieties of rainbowfish that come from soft acid water and do best in water with a pH around 6.0-7.0 and a GH below 100ppm (preferably below 50ppm). They are regularly found in waterways that are stained brown from plant tannins.

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Most cichlids are bred in prs although some of the mouth brooding African Rift Lake cichlids can be kept in colonies with 1 male and a group of females. Virtually all the other types of cichlids are best kept in prs (1 male & 1 female).

Some cichlids are mouth brooders and carry the eggs and newly hatched fry in a buccal pouch (extendable fold of skin in their throat). However, most cichlids lay their eggs on flat surfaces and guard the eggs and fry. Some cichlids like Kribensis and Apistogramma cacatuoides lay their eggs in caves. Blue rams lay their eggs on flat rocks. Freshwater angelfish will lay their eggs on the aquarium glass, Echinodorus (sword plants) or Cryptocoryne plant leaves, or on ceramic tubes. Discus and Uaru lay their eggs on the same surfaces as angelfish and after the eggs hatch the babies move onto the sides of the parent fish and feed of their mucous coating.

All cichlids provide parental care to their eggs and young and are generally considered easy to breed due to this fact. The fry are usually bigger than the fry of other egg laying fishes and this makes the babies easier to feed. They can normally eat newly hatched brineshrimp as soon as they start swimming. Most other fish fry need green water, infusoria or liquid fry foods, which are normally made from egg yolk.

 

[emeraldking]

Hi and welcome to TFF...
As already stated, there are lots of members with the right knowledge about these different species of fish. Just be sure to put the questions about each type of fish in the right section.

 

[Rusty_Shackleford]

I wish you much luck, but don't get your hopes up too high. Many many a hobbyist has tried to turn their hobby into an income producing business. Anything with animals especially exotic animals including fish may be boom or bust.
The reality is you can probably expect your "business" to help defray the costs of your "hobby".
That said I hope you make a million dollars. This has been your daily dose of reality.

 

[emeraldking]

I wish you much luck, but don't get your hopes up too high. Many many a hobbyist has tried to turn their hobby into an income producing business. Anything with animals especially exotic animals including fish may be boom or bust.
The reality is you can probably expect your "business" to help defray the costs of your "hobby".
That said I hope you make a million dollars. This has been your daily dose of reality.

I have to agree with this all...
You really have to be sure that it will work. Most of the time the idea sounds amazing but depending on where you're located, it can be a burden to sell those fish. If you would decide to sell those fish online, you can reach a wider public. So, you don't have to rely on customers from your own area.
If I look at myself, I was and am fortunate to offer rare livebearers at relevant events. And some of them are international. This has resulted that people from my own country and abroad have reached out to me to order rare livebearers from me. It came down to shipping fish to other counrtries. As long as you're open about the way you work and about the costs involved, people will accept this and order. And whether one would start a small business or more extended, one needs to be sure that one can be a potential entrepreneur on the market. Otherwise, you'll be losing money. And not just that... You'll be stuck with fish. And that will cost you money instead of gaining money. For the maintenance remains.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Forget the learning about fish par as all the knowledge you would need takes years to accumulate. So lets start with the easy part. You will need anywhere from $100,000 to $200,000 to pull it off. If you have that then you are through step one. Now all you have to do is to spend the next five years working in a store, keeping fish, going to monthly fish club meetings and attending weekeknd events. This will help you to make some of the contacts you will need.

I have both bred and imported fish. I had the money to do this on a small scale, I never had to lay out more than 15k for fish stocking. But I worked with the more pricey stuff but in a much narrower way than what you envision.

Early on I wanted to have a fish store, it seemed to me the easiest way to have the most fish. And my approach was simple. If I openeded a store I did not care if I never pocketed on cent for myself. My only requirement is I needed to be at least 95% sure I would not lose my entire investment. I never opened a store.

Good luck with your plans.

edited for typos

 

[Colin_T]

You could try doing some work experience at a pet shop for a month. See how they run on a day to day basis. A lot of people think a pet shop is just handling fluffy bunnies and serving customers but it isn't. We hardly ever handled the animals except when cleaning cages or showing the animals to customers. Most of the time we were cleaning tanks and cages, stocking shelves and serving customers.

First thing in the morning you open the place up because it stinks from animal poop, and turn the lights on. You remove covers from tanks and do the bodies (clean the dead fish out and record what died, which tank/s had problems, etc), and then treat any tank/s that need it and mark them not for sale. While one person is doing that other people are putting stock and signs out the front so people can see the shop is open. And other people are cleaning animal cages. The puppies were the worse and I couldn't always go into the shop first thing unless someone had already opened the doors and turned the fans on to blow the smell out. It was pretty bad sometimes and even the people who cared for the dogs would hold their breath, run in and open the doors and turn the fans on and then come back outside for 10 minutes.

After the morning cleaning you start tidying shelves, labelling stuff, putting stock away, serving customers, feed the fish and clean tanks. We had dog grooming and had customers bringing dogs in every hour or so throughout the day so someone would check them in and take the owner and dog out the back to the groomer so they can explain what they want done. That continued throughout the day and it was basically serve customers and tidy/ stock shelves and clean tanks and filters.

In the afternoon we fed, watered and cleaned cages again, mainly the puppies because they crap everywhere. Bring the stock and signs in from out the front. Check the tanks for bodies (we did this morning and night and if we saw bodies in tanks during the day we removed them asap). Covered aquariums, turned lights out and went home.

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If you only want to deal with aquatic pets (fish, amphibians, turtles) then start off selling online. It will be a lot cheaper than paying thousands of dollars each week for rent and power. You will be able to expand your hobby at home, breed a lot of fish at home and maybe import some to sell, and if you are still enjoying it after a year or two, then maybe expand some more. If you do this you will need an insulated fish room and we can offer advice on making them.

Businesses can buy stock from wholesalers in your country, online from importers and direct from the manufacturers. In this day and age a lot of shops are buying directly from China and bringing in a container load of stock, which lasts them months. That is probably too much for a new small business but you should be able to buy stock from China or anywhere nowadays. Try to buy decent brands that have a warranty if they are electrical or fish tanks. Although I wouldn't sell fish tanks online because they cost heaps to ship due to the size, weight and being made of glass. You could have people come and collect them from your property but you need to be careful letting strangers come to your place. If they see the fish you have they sometimes come back at night and steal them. If you have a fish room it needs to have a decent lock on the door and it's a good idea to harm some sort of surveillance.

If you bring fish in, try to find unusual fish as well as more common stuff and buy direct from collectors if possible. It will significantly reduce the chance of you getting incurable diseases like the Gourami Iridovirus or Fish Tuberculosis (TB). Having unusual stuff will set you apart from other sellers who only have common fish. Our livebearer expert here (Emeraldking) does this whereby he has common livebearers but also rare ones and it gives him more customers (those that want basic common fish and those that want something different). I did the same when breeding rainbowfish. I sold the more common fish (Melanotaenia lacustris, praecox, boesemani, Glossolepis incisus) every month and more unusual stuff got bred and sold less regularly. I might sell 2 or 3 rare species each month with the common ones and during the year I would breed all the rare stuff and sell them a few times a year because they didn't sell as well as others.

If you can get decent stock and breed them yourself, you will have a constant supply of fish and know they are disease free. If customers ask about a certain fish you can say we should have some for sale in 2 or 3 months, or however long it will be before you get them to a saleable size (generally 2-3 months if they are grown well).

 

[Rusty_Shackleford]

It's kinda humourous that we all love our hobby and our fish and we want to spread that love and be a LFS when we all know all the mom and pop LFS have been driven out of business by the big box corporate stores.
So the competition is fierce and you have to seperate yourself from the big box stores. The only thing you can offer that they don't is knowledge and customer service.

 

[Magnum Man]

When I 1st got into fish, they were sold nearly everywhere several local “dime stores” sold them ( I used to buy piranhas at the local Montgomery Wards store ) eventually we got a specific Fish store as well…
One note, this was before the www. and average life expectancy of fish was probably only a few months, with most fish… so a trip to the store, was an every other week trip…
Today the knowledge base is much better, and fish are living longer, and lots of the items stores sold, are available on the www. A trip to the fish store is made much less often, than it used to…

 

[emeraldking]

It's kinda humourous that we all love our hobby and our fish and we want to spread that love and be a LFS when we all know all the mom and pop LFS have been driven out of business by the big box corporate stores.
So the competition is fierce and you have to seperate yourself from the big box stores. The only thing you can offer that they don't is knowledge and customer service.

Big chains and average lfs's won't bother me at all. For most of them are focusing on the commercial known bred livebearers. I Myself hav focused on the rare livebearers. And I personally don't focus on the avergae customer who wants fish. I focus on the serious breeders of livebearers (show segment specimens and wild ones). Believe it or not, but this section of the aquarium fish market is pretty big.
For I do know that the average household with a fish tank will choose the more vibrant colors of breeding forms. So, that's not the market for me to work on. And actually, I wouldn't have it any other way, tbh.

But the dream to become rich of selling aquarium fish long terrm remains mostly a dream...

 

[Rusty_Shackleford]

Big chains and average lfs's won't bother me at all. For most of them are focusing on the commercial known bred livebearers. I Myself hav focused on the rare livebearers. And I personally don't focus on the avergae customer who wants fish. I focus on the serious breeders of livebearers (show segment specimens and wild ones). Believe it or not, but this section of the aquarium fish market is pretty big.
For I do know that the average household with a fish tank will choose the more vibrant colors of breeding forms. So, that's not the market for me to work on. And actually, I wouldn't have it any other way, tbh.

But the dream to become rich of selling aquarium fish long terrm remains mostly a dream...

That's cool. I know there a a lot of specialized livebearer groups across the U.S. But yeah the average person probably wouldn't be interested in what you have to offer. But the ones that are would go nuts for your stock.
I used to know a few guys that were old timers, they would come to our Cichlid club meeting because they were die hard fish heads, but they only kept guppies and swordtails. Really high end guppies and swordtails.