Flying (with) Fish
by Preston Becker
First published in Gravel Gossip, Diamond State Aquarium Society
Aquarticles
This summer's talk at the DSAS meeting about pond and pet supplies in Europe got me to
thinking about importing fish from abroad. So when I went out of the country recently, I
thought long and hard about buying some fish. I went to a few fish stores, and they had
different varieties than we can get here in the states, and I found that the prices for
certain fish were much cheaper. I decided to buy some fish and try to bring them home as
an experiment.
I got the local yellow pages, and I called around until I found a fish store that had
compressed oxygen. A few hours before I headed to the airport, I went to the fish store.
At the store, I looked around, trying to decide what to buy. I had a freshwater community
aquarium that had some space, but I didn't want to import anything that was either
endangered or would be threatening to the local wildlife. I saw some lovely varieties of
angelfish. While angelfish are among the pricier freshwater fish here in the United
States, they were cheap abroad. I chose two juvenile Gold Marbled Veiltail Angelfish. My
two angelfish cost about a dollar each. A bargain.
After some discussion with the storeowner, I had the two angels packed up for a long
journey. I made sure that the fish were double bagged, received a squirt of Stress Coat,
and that the bag was filled with oxygen. I placed this into a dark paper bag to reduce
stress, and placed that inside a small backpack which was my carryon luggage for the trip
back. The store owner was intrigued with my experiment, and gave me his e-mail so I could
let him know the results of the experiment.
I headed to the airport. Checking in at the airport was not problem. Once on the plane,
I placed the backpack containing my two flying fish under the seat in front of me. The
flight was about ten hours long, and when I reached the States, both of the angelfish were
alive and kicking.
After passport control, I got my suitcase and I headed to customs. If I was going to
have a problem with my two fish, it would be here. I needed to fill out my Customs Form.
In addition to my fish, I also had some fruit and a salami. I expected there to be one
place to check for the food another for the fish, but there was only one box on the form
marked "I am bringing fruits, plants, meats, food, soil, birds, snails or other live
animals." I checked the animals/food box on the custom form, and went to the red
"stuff to declare" line. The customs officer asked what food I had. I showed
them the fruit and salami. The fruit was taken from me since I could not bring it into the
States, but they looked up my salami in their book and said it was okay. Then they said
"do you have anything else to declare?" I had my receipts and explanation ready.
Holding up my bag I said, "I have two fish in this bag." They replied,
"Fish? No problem. Go on through." The fish and I were home!
Once back at my house, I put the two angels in a five gallon quarantine tank that I had
up and running with a few neon tetras in it. A month later, since my two angels had shown
no signs of disease or parasites, I moved them to my larger community aquarium. They
seem happy there, and have since almost doubled in size.
So that's the saga of the flying fish. I would not advocate trying to bring any fish
into the country yourself unless you are prepared for the possibility that the customs
officials might confiscate them the way they did my fruit. However, if you are prepared to
take that risk, you might get some fun fish for your tank if you ever travel abroad. Even
though I could probably have bought my two angelfish at Petsmart, I did find it a useful
and entertaining way to procure two fresh new fish.
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