With so many options available, which is the best choice of supplier for your livestock? We look at some of the options.
WORDS: NATHAN HILL
Bricks and mortar shops
Local stores are the obvious choice for many. You can pick the exact fish you want, and have the advantage of seeing them in real time to check for the likes of damage, deformities or diseases. There’s also minimal transport time involved in getting the fish back home and safe.
On the downside, not all local stores are that good, and your experience of the hobby might only be as good as the most knowledgeable member of staff there. If they can’t look after their own fish, you might be buying poor quality, undernourished, or wholly unsuitable livestock. Legally trading stores will have a Pet Shop License which offer some credentials, but be wary of ‘shed sellers’ that aren’t trading through the usual channels.
Most brick-and-mortar stores have some sort of policy regarding fish that die shortly after purchase, often including prompt water testing to find out exactly what has happened, which brings many aquarists peace of mind.
Online shops
The online marketplace is a mix of established brick-and-mortar stores selling fish online, as well as dedicated online-only sellers.
Online purchasing is largely flying blind, though you can request to see a video or photos of the exact fish you intend to buy—images of fish advertised on a website can be a mix of library images and actual livestock. Without seeing the fish, you can’t check for diseases of deformities, and you can’t verify the likes of sexed pairs, so you’re entirely in the hands of the seller.
Stick with reputable online sellers and you’ll be okay. These stores are forced to trade on their reputations and try their hardest to make sure everything runs smoothly.
Online sellers may carry fish that you cannot source locally, or you may simply have no local store (or at least a decent one) to visit.
Check the water conditions of an online seller before purchasing, as they may have a totally different pH and hardness to your own tank, and this needs to be factored in.
Note also that because of set carriage costs, it makes more sense to buy fish online in bulk rather than in ones or twos (or to buy expensive, specialist fish). Just buying five neon tetra will be very costly in freight.
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