By Tom Wojtech, MAS

In asking the part-time clerk, Ed Cohen, about the species and what to do with it, I was told about the Milwaukee Killifish Association, now WAKO. Ed said if I was interested, I should go to the next meeting at his house. I found out he only lived a few blocks from my parents’ home so I had no excuse. This was the beginning of my slide to geekdom. I met Gary Greenwood, Jim Gasior and Craig Berg among others you would not recognize and saw some of the most beautiful fish ever. I couldn’t believe the colors packed on these small fish. The most intense reds and blues you could imagine. I had to have them.

I eventually bought a copy of Scheels’ book "Rivulins of the Old World" which had superb pictures of every killie you could possibly want. I digested that book and set out to own every fish in the book. It took a couple years but I did it. I was successful with nearly every species I tried and was getting quite jaded with the ease of breeding these riverine beauties. I was getting bored. Then there was a surge of fish from South America. These weren’t in THE book.

Some were attractive, like Cynolebias nigripinnus with a black body and blue dots, but most were shades of brown with some blue highlights like Rivulus tenuis. They were the Old Worlds’ poorer cousins. One of the first that I was able to obtain through the AKA’s New and Rare Species Committee was Pterolebius maculipinnis. This was a tan fish with a herringbone pattern of pale blue lines on his body and fringed tail with a pale yellow edge. It was beautiful. I started to acquire as many South American Killies I could find. It wasn’t easy since few were in the country and most were very difficult to propagate, but I persevered. At auctions my hand went up for every South American species that came to the block. Since I was devoting most of my aquarium space to my new loves, the old ones had to leave. This was the start of my sullied reputation. On the one hand I was keeping a group of fish noted for their brilliant colors but my interest had evolved to the least colorful Killies available.

This trip into the world of Killies had also placed me in the middle of a discovery phase. From the MKA I learned there were a lot of defective people out there who were keeping all kinds of fish. I rapidly joined the Milwaukee Aquarium Society, American Killifish Association, Chicago Killifish Association, Milwaukee Cichlid Club and the American Cichlid Association. Previously, I was content to have a few tanks and work with one species at a time developing and perfecting my breed and dump personality. In a short time I had 50 tanks in a fishroom in my parents’ basement. It didn’t stop there. I was president, vice president and show chair, variously, in four clubs. I gave talks, judged shows, wrote articles and had shown a lot of fish locally and nationally. I was mailing fish all over the country.

Cichlids were becoming my second favorite fish. I had a love affair with the small Apistogramma, West African Kribs, and most of the small to medium South American cichlids. This was during the late sixties and early seventies when the "new" African cichlids were just starting to be imported. I jumped on the bandwagon too. I had some of the Pseudotropheus, Julies, Haplochromis and Labeotropheus that started to be available. They were different from most of the cichlids I had kept since most were mouthbrooders and colorful. They had bright blues and yellow and some were accented with red highlights. They turned out to be fairly easy to induce spawning, so prices on these rarities rapidly dropped. Many hobbyists were trying to get the newest imports and be the first to have babies to sell before the price dropped.

I rarely sold fish at this time and with my breed and dump attitude perfected, I couldn’t sustain my interest for more than one spawning and would give away the babies to make room for the next fish. The Africans that came in were mostly of the Mbuna types with a few of the peacocks showing up occasionally. They were all easy to breed and had the same personality: none. They chased; they spawned; you stripped the females: babies. They were boring.

Everyone was enthralled with these new boring fish with no personality. I received more than my share of abuse for not liking the new bright colors. This only served to nurture the belief that I only liked brown fish. Oh, I would occasionally slip and get one or two of the brightly colored Africans, only to go back to the real cichlids I preferred. My true loves the New World cichlids. I never met a Cichlasomine or Geophagan I didn’t like or an Aequidens either for that matter.

I am more likely to buy a fish because of its’ behavior, rarity or, most often, because I’ve never seen it before, than because it has bright blue or red or yellow colors. I am also one of those people who prefers to have a wild type fish than a tank bred color variety. Again, this put me in a position to receive more abuse from those of little taste who actually liked the triple red cacatuoides and the absolutely hideous Pigeon Blood Discus. These people need to see some of the wild types and learn to appreciate what Nature had already perfected.

I would like everyone within the sound of my voice to seek out some of my favorite fish and tell me if they are not the most beautiful fish you have ever seen. See if you can find a group of wild Brown Discus. You will be shocked at the warm honey brown bodies with dark brown bars and intense red and blue striations through the face and dorsal, ventral and anal fins. Look for some adult Geophagus altifrons and tell me you don’t like the green bodies with rows of iridescent stripes and blue and red streaked fins with trailers longer than their bodies. If you have ever seen a full grown group of Uaru amphiacanthoides, I’m sure you will agree with me that their quiet beauty and elegance is stunning, in spite of their somber coloring. They are gray brown with a jet-black teardrop by their eye and a black triangle on their body.

I know you would be able to find Chocolate Cichlids, the ultimate brown fish with a mahogany back and chocolate belly. Even the lowly Honey Dwarf Gourami packs a wallop of color: honey brown bodies with jet black bellies and a yellow edged dorsal fin. If you are ever lucky enough to find Betta albimarginata, drink in the warm brown body with the black and white margined fins and tell me you’re not in the presence of greatness. I couldn’t stop without praising the browns in an adult male Cynolebias whitei, a fish that was mistaken for a wild Betta when I first showed one in the early seventies. It has a mahogany body with greenish blue spangles on its body and fins.

I do see some hope for the brown, as hobbyists get smarter, they are starting to realize the wild forms have a lot to offer. Countries across the globe are putting more and more restrictions on what can be shipped to the worlds’ aquarium hobbyists. As habitats decline, some of these fish may never be seen again and it is up to us to keep them going in our tanks. So take note, brown is beautiful.