MEET AN AQUARIST SERIES: NEW ZEALAND
Part Three. Gordon McKay

By Howard Norfolk
Aquarticles.com

Ever since he was eight years old Gordon McKay has kept aquariums, at first being helped by an uncle who was a fish breeder. For many years he was active in the Canterbury Aquarium and Pond Society. He still has forty aquariums at home.

Most of his life Gordon worked in the building industry in Christchurch New Zealand, and had his own construction company. But four years ago he quit building houses, and now spends his time working at "Critter Kingdom," the pet store that he and his family started ten years ago after taking over a bankrupt business.

  "Critter Kingdom"

THE RETAIL STORE:

I met Gordon and his wife Noela in the store at 213 Blenheim Road in Christchurch. Critter Kingdom is a large general pet store. Of course it has an aquarium section, and it also deals in dogs, cats, birds, rabbits, rats, mice, chinchillas, guinea pigs and turtles. New Zealand's pet and quarantine laws are quite strict (more about this later), so reptiles, geckos and snakes cannot legally be sold or kept, and even birds cannot be imported (they must be bred by local breeders).

   The main fish sales room. Most tanks contain several different species of fish.

  Discus for sale

Gordon says that the pet business in Christchurch is very competitive and there are more pet shops per head in Christchurch than anywhere else in New Zealand. Despite the competition, and helped by a current upsurge in the aquarium hobby, Critter Kingdom has been very successful. It is now the biggest pet store in Christchurch, and Gordon's son Errol is presently developing an even larger store in another part of town.

Critter Kingdom is a destination store. It is not in the busy town centre where casual shoppers might drop in, but is rather on a main suburban road dotted with car dealers, warehouses, large furniture stores, and the like. This gives the luxury of space, and an inconspicuous door at the back of the retail area leads to where Gordon the builder likes to spend his days - the large warehouse and workshop!

THE WORKSHOP:

New Zealand does not have any large fish tank factories, and importing them has always been difficult and expensive. It is people like Gordon who make tanks for retail, and this is one of the things Gordon likes to spend his time doing. He has a large table set up for cutting glass and assembling aquariums, and lots of glass of different thickness in stock. He makes the tanks entirely of glass held together with silicone without a metal frame. Although he quotes the capacity in litres (New Zealand is now metric), the measurements are in feet and inches, to fit U.S. or Chinese accessories such as canopies. Gordon will custom make tanks as required, and spoke proudly of a jig he has made up so that he can drill holes in assembled tanks without the drill slipping.

  Gordon was working on this tank when I arrived.

Gordon also makes steel tank stands. He used to use his carpentry skills to make wooden tank stands, but now leaves this to others.

Just outside the workshop, he had also nearly finished cutting and welding this steel tank stand.

The retail store has two rooms full of aquarium accessories. These tanks were made by Gordon, and the wooden stands by local craftsmen.

  The warehouse portion of the store contains holding ponds for goldfish and plants.

QUARANTINE:

As mentioned before, quarantine laws in New Zealand are very strict. The country's isolation from the rest of the World means that it is just about possible to keep out foreign pests and diseases, and the authorities try very hard to do so. Their zeal affects everyone arriving from overseas. On landing, visitors are strictly warned not to bring in any foodstuffs, let alone animals or plants. The soles of my golf shoes were closely examined for cleanliness, and the same would apply to camping equipment. When I landed New Zealand a few years ago, we all had to sit still in our aircraft seats whilst officials marched down the aisles spraying the entire plane with aerosol disinfectant! That practice seems to have been stopped now.

New Zealand has its own eco-system, with many unique animals and plants. It also has many that are familiar to Europeans, since in the early days British settlers brought in species that would make them feel more at home. Thus one can readily spot sparrows, thrushes, chaffinches, crows and other European birds, and in the fields farmers keep sheep, cows, horses and deer. In the rivers and lakes one can fish for salmon, rainbow trout, brown trout, perch, rudd, and carp.

But introduced species and diseases have caused some problems. For instance, opossums from Australia are real pests, and Gordon told me that there are so many koi choking the Waikato River on the North Island that two men make a living catching them commercially for food. Some catfish species are also causing concern.

Given this background, it is not surprising that it is a complicated process to import fish and aquatic plants into New Zealand from overseas. Some species are banned altogether, notably cold water fish such as koi and goldfish, and also "coldwater tropicals" such as white clouds, paradise fish, and some killifish - anything that might survive if released into the wild, particularly in the warmer North Island. There used to be a list of fish and plants that were "not allowed" but this caused confusion, so it has now been changed to species that "are allowed." New species must be appealed for, and Gordon has noticed that the rules are sometimes interpreted differently on the North and South Islands. Some species imported into the South Island cannot be sent to the North. Koi may no longer be kept at all, and fish such as goldfish and white clouds are maintained from stock that arrived before the regulations were laid down. Some species are questionable - there is currently a dispute over the legality of keeping the vallisneria plant and Gordon has had to withhold his stock from sale.

As a hobbyist, Gordon was the second person to get an import licence when the rules started thirty years ago, and just one year ago he re-applied and set up a quarantine facility at the Critter Kingdom store. He is one of the few wholesalers in New Zealand with importing facilities, and when he told me what is involved I wasn't surprised why!

To get a quarantine licence one must not have a criminal record and must get permission from the City Council (cost NZ$450). A quarantine facility must be set up in its own self-contained locked area. Gordon's quarantine room cost NZ$45,000 to build.(Over US$20,000). Staff must be provided with a manual of procedures, and on entering the room must wear special gumboots and overalls. (It used to be obligatory to have a footbath).

  The entrance to the Quarantine Room is guarded by imposing official signs.

Imported freshwater fish must be quarantined for six weeks, and saltwater for three weeks. They are inspected weekly by officials from the Ministry of Agriculture and Forests, who charge NZ$65 per hour for their visits, (which adds up to NZ$400 to NZ$800 per shipment). If problems are found, an entire shipment can be condemned by the inspectors, with no compensation.

Fairly large shipments are needed to make all this worthwhile, and Critter Kingdom's shipments are normally worth NZ$8-10,000. They come mostly from Singapore, Indonesia, Fiji and other Pacific Islands, and as well as selling the fish in his store, Gordon wholesales them to other retailers on both the North and South Islands.

Since it was right after Christmas, at the time of my visit no shipment was being quarantined and I was able to freely enter the room, which is also used as a fish breeding room. It contains about seventy tanks, ranging in size from 45 litres to 1500 litres.

* New Zealanders build their tanks in feet and inches, but estimate their capacity in litres.
100 litres = 22 Imperial gallons = 26 US gallons

Fish keepers in Christchurch are very fortunate in that their water comes directly from aquifers underneath the Canterbury alluvial plain. It is untreated and is very pure, with a pH of 7.3 and 30 p.p.m. Hardness. This makes the quarantine requirement that each tank have a separate water system easy to comply with - each tank is topped up individually straight from the tap, and drains with an overflow system. Filters are not needed in most of the tanks. A few species, such as discus, need their water modified.

Gordon employs an aquarist to look after the fish room (presently it is Sean Canovan, who I also visited - see next article). I made notes of the many species of fish that were being bred. They included mollies, platies, swordtails, some guppies; dwarf gouramis, bettas; white clouds; cherry, tiger and gold barbs; pearl danios; lemon, neon, sterbae, black phantom and glow-light tetras; various catfishes; discus, severums, uarus; various African cichlids, and axolotls. Quite a variety, but no goldfish - Gordon says there is not enough room.

     Discus and uaru are amongst the fish being bred.

This large grow-out tank contains at least eight species of fish.

Gordon readily admits that he is completely computer-illiterate and has no intention of ever learning. So perhaps one of the reasons he spends so much time in the area at the back of his store is that he can't work his own computerised sales registers! But his son Errol is just the opposite, and has set up a sideline business on the Internet, selling pets and pet supplies throughout New Zealand. Critter Kingdom's web site may be found at www.netpet.co.nz

Gordon is a fortunate man. When he gave up the house building trade he found the ideal alternative - a business where he can combine some of his practical skills with his lifetime aquarium hobby, and at the same time work together with his family.

.....Go to Part Four: Sean Canovan