Dear Aquarist,
One of the coldest months of the year turned out to be warm and sunny when Joe Yaiullo, Curator of the Long Island Aquarium in Riverhead, Long Island arrived. His presentation entitled “Sometimes It’s The Little Things” was fascinating. This event was a wake-up call for marine and freshwater hobbyists alike because it spoke about setting up the steps to prevent catastrophe, planning ahead so disaster doesn’t strike and having redundancy parts and equipment in the event something fails. It was an enlightening and educational adventure from one of our oldest and dearest friends. Joe was kind enough to donate cuttings from the corals in his 20,000 gallon aquarium. The audience was very interested and asked many questions.
BAS has a new program that we want all to participate in. In memory of BAS Editor John Todaro we have created the John Todaro Memorial Writers Award. Any size article, you can add drawings or pictures for extra points, can be member and non-member allowed to enter, only 3 articles per author will be judged by a BAS committee. We have 1st prize is $50.-, 2nd prize is $25.-, 3rd prize is $15 and several Honorable Mention prizes of $5.- if the articles submitted warrant an award (all payments are in BAS Bucks). Starts now and ends at the July Board meeting. More on this in near future.
The winds of March will blow in Jason D’Ambrosio, President of the North Jersey Aquarium Society and his topic for the evening will be Stingray Husbandry. Yes, you can breed stingrays in your home aquarium, providing you take the necessary steps to keep them happy.
The Brooklyn Aquarium Society turned 109 years young on Valentine’s Day. We are the oldest and largest general aquarium club in the United States and that is because of you – our members, our Board and Officers and the love we all have for aquatic creatures. So come on down on March 13 for an enjoyable evening with great people. We always try to have an interesting topic for you and our aquatic auction and sales tables can’t be beat. As always there will be FREE parking and FREE refreshments, doors open at 7:30 pm.
New BAS shirts arrived along with hats and patches so get them before they sell out. We will have a new T-Shirt contest. You may submit as many entrees as you want and judging will take place at our June event. The winning T-Shirt will be available for sale at our September meeting. Many noticed the BAS officers and Board members wore the regular BAS shirt with the word TEAM on the back. We did this to identify our members that work and help organize our events.
If you want to see different speakers and learn about different aquatic systems, fish, plants and marine life, please let me know. The elected officials of the Brooklyn Aquarium Society are here to serve YOU! Please let us know what you want and why, because it would be helpful to everyone. It is important that you visit and patronize our sponsors. It goes full circle: by helping them, they are also helping you as hobbyists and everyone is helping the Brooklyn Aquarium Society, so help us, help you!
For more info, please call our BAS Hotline at (718) 837-4455, or visit our modern website at WWW.BROOKLYNAQUARIUMSOCIETY.ORG.
On a more personal note – any member who wants to attend a Board meeting, which is held at Education Hall of the New York Aquarium on the 1st Friday of the month, September through June, please notify me at (347) 277-4793 by the Tuesday before the meeting.
Steven Matassa
President