Last month we completed our 115th year at BAS. It was a very hot night, with the air conditioning on the fritz, and yet our diehard members stayed for the whole night. I guess they wanted to get their fix of our club before the summer. I am sure come September, we will have a much more comfortable night. Thank you members for putting up with that.

We also held club elections, to appoint new and existing board members. Thank you to our wonderful staff who work so hard to bring you the best club around. I might sound a little bias, but I believe it’s true.

Ever since Covid we continue to bring up our membership, with the diligent work behind the show. We are always looking for ways to improve our club, in numbers and quality.

We see all loyal members and new face all the time. Thank you BAS!

Page MacGregor spoke on the rescue center for axolotls, and gave a great talk. Page traveled all the way from Massachusetts, so we thank her for taking the time to address our club. In September we will be bringing you Andrew Sandler and get an update on his 17,000 gallon reef tank.

We still need to be out of the building, by 11:30 so we ask that when the auction ends and you are NOT a board member, exit as soon as you can. We need to clean up and put everything back to where it was. We also ask that you pickup around where you were sitting, and throw away all garbage. The NYA allows us to use Education Hall so we need to respect the venue, and keep it clean so we can keep having our meetings here for the next 50 years.

We are now taking entries for our t-shirt contest, so enter your drawings before August 22nd. Enter as many as you like. We will announce our winner at the September meeting. Send all entries to editor@basny.org Your design file should not exceed 10 mb and your image should be at least 1500 pixels x 1500 pixels.

Our photo contest is also still running, so enter your pictures. You can enter as often and as many as you like. As you know, taking good pictures of your fish is challenging, but showing off your tank can be satisfying.

We have a new format for parking effective immediately. We are back in with the parking lot at NYA, with some new rules. The gates will be open at 7:00 pm and close at 8:30 pm. Anyone arriving after will have to find street parking on West 10th Street and enter through the boardwalk gate. The front gates will reopen at 10:30 to close. If you have to leave before, please use street parking. You must have your active membership card on you for entrance. If you don’t have one we will issue one free for the first time —after, we will charge $1 dollar for replacement. Please try to help us with the new rules, or we risk losing the parking lot.

I have notice members opening boxes at the sales table. Please if you want to buy something ask our sales person to show it to you. But if you have no intention of buying it, please don’t open anything. You would not do that in your local pet shop, so please don’t do it here. It is hard to get back in the box; pieces go missing and waste our sales person time.

When bidding on items during the auction, please keep your hand up if you are interested. Once your hand is down the auctioneer will move to the next bidder. This saves us time so we can finish up by 11:30.

Let us know if you want speakers on a particular aquatic topic. We need our members to be more involved as we are always trying to improve our club. So let us know your ideas! Also consider lending a hand at the meetings. It takes a lot of hard work from our board members to put on an organized, informative and entertaining show every month. Anyone wishing to help out, we will gladly give you something to do.

Remember to visit our Facebook page where we feature items for sale from, manufacturers, and donations.  We always have tanks and equipment for sale. If you are looking for something aquatic, please reach out to us. We probably have it in storage. We can’t bring everything to the meeting! Also if you have any aquatic related items you don’t need, we will always take them for our sales table.

Our sole publication, AquaticNews, is published twice a year: Winter/Spring and Summer/Fall. Any hobby or aquatic information you hear or read about, please share with our editor, Ginny Cahill at editor@basny.org. We are always looking for your input on our events and publications!

Have a safe summer see you in September.

For more info, please call out hotline 718-837-4455