Everyone who has come to see the fish get to stick their heads in this bucket its a good way of seeing into the water here I am showing a guest how to use it, all I did was get some glass from an old pair of diving googles and silicone them into the bottom, you can buy commercially made ones if you like. notice the water snails around the edge of the tank they help to keep it clean.

If you wish to visit the breeding facility you must phone stephen on 0407843998 the best time to visit is the spring to summer period .

Blue gums are they friend or foe ? I don’t know however lots of individuals believe they are bad for the black fish that inhabit the streams and river which flow through or past the trees. As far as I can see there are several ways a tree could be dangerous to fish the first is any herbicide that was used when the trees  were first planted second is there a chemical in the leaves that could cause problems and third is it the monoculture plantings, meaning that all the trees are of the one variety and if there is some chemical being exuded from the trees could the grouping of so many of the same trees cause a build up of chemicals that then make there way into the rivers and streams. Test will need to carried out to determine which one is causing the problem.

These birds are in my greenhouse looking for insects they are in no danger from chemicals because there are none, I don’t use any chemicals just fresh water  I realise that if you have a balanced environment then chemicals are not needed I accept if you have a higher density of fish some chemicals are required to maintain health however they must be kept to a minimum we are farming water just as much as fish good water equals good fish. It follows that if we wish to have these balanced and diverse ecosystem in the wild we must keep chemicals out of our environment and of course our water.Blackfish have a habit of stirring up the detritus on the bottom of there habitat and then trawling back through it to collect any food that may have been dislodged this behaviour could be a reason why they are exposed to higher levels of toxins than other species of fish.  I think these birds are a type of finch.

Over the years river blackfish have had to where the tag of being aggressive I have found the opposite to be the case, it is however true if you put two ore more fish in a small container they will fight ( what constitutes a small container I have 10 medium fish in 4500 litres of water and there is no sign of aggression )  and around mating season they do become mare aggressive however this is true of almost all wild animals two lions in a small gage will fight.

the books will need to be revised and the part about aggression moderated, it stops breeders from considering these fish for aquaculture while this unfortunate tag hangs over them. To say they are aggressive is to go against the literature which says that they do not travel far from there home area( about twenty metres ) if this is to be believed then we must conclude that the tag of aggression is simply wrong.

One of the great things about living in the country is you are able to have a bonfire here we are burning old pine that’s been sitting around here for years the dog is keeping a eye on things. We would have had crackers once but some good people thought it was to dangerous for the mere people to have fireworks better of with drugs instead.

I know there has been a lot of grubs later but this is the food at moment and these grubs and moths have a lot of protein and fats that will make the fish happy and hopefully wanting to mate in the springtime.

Baby wood grubs in the fire wood, the fish in no /2 tank thought they were very tasty.

I put this picture up for our English readers. Hello to Jon and Carol in Essex England . Notice the pebble in the background.

It would be helpful to discover why some fish grow faster than others, this disparity in growth rates could cause a problem for future farming especially in open ponds like the ones I have constructed.

This is the Curdies river in the southwest of Victoria it rises in or about the stoy rises near lake Purrumbete and flows through the Curdies valley  until it reaches the sea at Peterborough, As you can see it has great habitat for blackfish but none have been caught there for years at least to my knowledge if anybody has information to the contrary please let me know. the rivers and creeks in the southwest should hold populations of blackfish and they don’t WHY. contact me on my mob /0407843998