I'm an undergrad student at Michigan State University here in frozen East
Lansing, Michigan, U.S.A. I am majoring in the fiseries end of fisheries and
wildlife management, specializing in aquaculture. I live in a dorm room and
keep all my fish with me. I've kept fish all of my life, the hobby was passed
on to me from my father in his genes. I've kept 'bows for a couple of years
now regularly, and had them a few times before that. I must admit, however,
that the difficulty of getting decent fish is getting pretty discouraging.
Aside from rainbows, I'm keenly interested in livebearers, characoids,
cichlids, and just about everything else. I'm also really interested in native
fish of North America, but I don't really have much right now. I'd really like
to acquire some non-rainbow Austrailian fishes, but they're pretty hard to come
by. Currently I maintain 24 tanks (in my dorm room!) that range anywhere from
2.5 to 90 gallons. If anybody's interested in seeing what I keep, check out my
web page, everything's on there except a couple of Loricariids and an Anostomid
that I can't identify.
Besides keeping fish and going to school, I work. So what do I do for a
living? I'm one of those people in 'the industry'! Ick! I've worked in pet
shops for the last 6 years, and still do when I'm off from school. I'm also an
'Ambassador' for Marineland Aquarium Products, manufacturers of such fine
products as Penguin Filters, Emperor Filters, Magnum Cannister Filters, and the
line of Bio-Wheel pro filters. I know, you're saying, 'Look at that, all those
retailers, they're all the same.' Basically what I do for them is work as a
sales rep who deals with the public rather than dealing with distributers. I
help keep individual stores happy with the product, and I also demo product to
the public in stores. So, if anybody out there has a Marineland product and
has any questions, needs any help, etc., then just send me some email and I'll
see what I can do for you.
So, that's pretty much me. When Michigan isn't frozen (usually about 2 weeks
in August) I also like to bike and sail about on my 21' sailboat. Next?
Later...
If you didn't see it, you missed it.
Chris Benes
beneschr at pilot.msu.edu
http://www.msu.edu/user/beneschr
Rainbowfish Study Group http://home.earthlink.net/~sbuckel/
Michigan Cichlid Association