If the January meeting is any indication, we’re in for a great year in the Breeder Award Program! Five members recorded nine first spawns and three second spawns for the specialty program. The “Breeder of the Year” competition is off to a good start with Matt DeGroodt and Chip Hildreth tied for the lead. Matt entered two killifish from wild caught Florida parents: sheepshead minnows (Cyprinodon variegatus) and blue fin killies (Lucania goodei). He also threw in the Lake Tanganyikan cave spawning Julidochromis transcriptus as well. Chip entered the West African cave spawning cichlid Pelvicachromis taeniatus moliwe and an unusual cave spawning Badis buxar. Tied for third in the BOY standings are Dan Koenig and Larry Jinks. Dan entered two livebearers to edge closer to the livebearer specialty award. He donated the Goodeid livebearer Goodea atripinnis and the Poeciliid Gambusia holbrooki, the native mosquito fish. Larry entered a first spawn of Corydoras axelrodi and donated second spawns of Corydoras venezuelanus, Corydoras stenocephalus and Aspidoras spilotus to move closer to the catfish specialty award. Veteran breeder and January speaker Neil Frank stands in fifth place in the BOY with a South American substrate spawning cichlid (Gymnogeophagus sp. “Catalan”) which he showed in his program and donated to our monthly auction.

The board okayed a change to the BAP. In keeping up with modern technology, a member may now submit a video of his fish for fry verification. The member must still fill out and turn in the BAP form found on our website (which can be submitted by email). The video must include the names and date information and we prefer seeing video of both the parents and fry. Matt and Neil are working on some way of cataloging the videos and making them available on our website as we do with the BAP records, standings, and newsletters.