PlanetCatfish.com

Snorkeling the 25,000 gal carp exhibit:

that must surprise the daylights out of them!! :)

kvnbyl wrote: ↑22 Jul 2019, 04:13 that must surprise the daylights out of them!!

Haha, thanks, brother. If you watched the video, you could have gauged the intensity of their surprise as well as I could

gives sleeping with the fishes a whole meaning!

BigRich and Tracey of Ohio Fish Rescue paid us a visit a couple weeks ago after the Florida Monster Fish Bash in Boca Raton, FL, and made a video post:

A lot of new fish? Obviously this wasn't all at once.

As always, thanks for sharing!

Cheers, Eric

Just been catching up, you have so many awesome fish! Are you any nearer to being able to open to the public?

Thank you, guys. If I didnt fail my fire inspection last summer, we'd probably already opened. As it is, I had finished redoing the electrical and need to finish building one more tank, 10K gal, and place it on line and then try for my inspection again. If I pass it, I can open.

Good luck with the inspection Viktor, been catching up with your videos recently and enjoying them. Keep up the good work!

Agree with Marc. Good luck getting past that inspection this time. Hope to see you open soon.

Cheers, Eric

I subbed to your Youtube channel just to see all your updates as soon as you have them, even though I have been following this thread for quite a while. Hope everything goes well with the upcoming inspection.

A heartfelt thank you, guys. You support is very humbling to me.

One of the original 4500 gal developed a fiberglass seam separation on the bottom and a slow leak. It's the one with the brutes - RTC, Jau, Piraiba, pacu, and Co. They will have to go into the prospective 10K, while I drain the 4500 gal and redo the seam. Just a glimpse of what else needs to be done, in addition to finishing barriers around the tanks, street signage, more parking space, educational materials, etc.

That mud puddle is crazy!

Viktor Jarikov wrote: ↑12 May 2020, 16:32 A heartfelt thank you, guys. You support is very humbling to me.

One of the original 4500 gal developed a fiberglass seam separation on the bottom and a slow leak. It's the one with the brutes - RTC, Jau, Piraiba, pacu, and Co. They will have to go into the prospective 10K, while I drain the 4500 gal and redo the seam. Just a glimpse of what else needs to be done, in addition to finishing barriers around the tanks, street signage, more parking space, educational materials, etc.

Viktor,
How close are you to opening? I for one would like to help and I am sure may others would as well. Perhaps you can distribute some of the workload? Although members here are from all over the world, we can all contribute towards ideas, marketing, information towards educational materials etc. Perhaps some members are very good at business, others at community engagement, digital art, logos etc. Just be sure you have full copyright before accepting assistance.

* Do you have a name for this venture yet? "DIY Public Aquarium" or "Hobbyist Public Aquarium" And a registered web domain?
* If we watch your youtube videos (including adverts) does that assist you?
* Do you have any merchandise for sale? shirts, mugs, car decals, etc which are good for marketing as well as financial assistance. You already have a lot to do so perhaps you could outsource the merchandising.
* Perhaps you could have a storyboard for each of the rescue fish you have? This may increase the financial donations.
* Perhaps you could run some volunteer workshops for keen fish keepers in your local area?
* Perhaps you could provide a weekly report on what projects are coming up, how they progress and some of the problems solved.
* Please let us know what we can do to assist.

Lookng forward to being one of your paying visitors once COVID vacinne becomes available.

Thank you so much for this!

How close are you to opening?
***IDK. Since 2015, I thought I'd open each year, or the next; then the next year, then, as it wound down, I thought the next; repeat; repeat; same is happening this year. I have little time to dedicate to moving us closer to opening, usually 2-4 hours a day on average, including Sat and Sun. The rest of my time is taken up by property maintenance, repairs, fish rescues, small odd jobs, other activities that have nothing to do with the actual building.

I for one would like to help and I am sure many others would as well. Perhaps you can distribute some of the workload?
***I appreciate this beyond words but the main obstacle is property maintenance. We have two houses, 6000 sq ft under AC, another 2000 sq ft of screened patio space, the lot is 10 acres, the fish pavilions take up another 5000 sq ft. All of this needs upkeep and maintenance, it's a swim against the current. If anything breaks, I try my best to fix it myself because we conserve money as best we could, we are barely keeping our head above water here, have been for many years. It's everything. Mowing takes me from 16 to 32 hours depending on season. Two old cars. The houses are aged, the appliances, the three 5.5 ton AC units are old, the 12,000 GPD RO system is getting old, something breaks periodically, the poorly built pump house is falling apart, the vegetation needs trimming, we have a thousand or more of trees, and as many bushes, flowers, etc. and the yard waste needs to be collected and burned every day, about 100-200 gallons of yard waste every day year round, weed spraying takes up about 1 hour every day 365 days a year, feeding fish takes up 2 hours every day, and so on and so forth. You know all this firsthand better than me as your fish operation is 10x bigger.

Although members here are from all over the world, we can all contribute towards ideas, marketing, information towards educational materials etc. Perhaps some members are very good at business, others at community engagement, digital art, logos etc. Just be sure you have full copyright before accepting assistance.
***Thank you.

* Do you have a name for this venture yet? "DIY Public Aquarium" or "Hobbyist Public Aquarium" And a registered web domain?
***dba "Fish Story Aquarium and Rescue". The legal name "IchthyoPark" even educated people couldn't pronounce No web domain, no site, no time for even a FB or IG page. Only YT channel, MFK and PCF.


* If we watch your youtube videos (including adverts) does that assist you?
***Thank you Not really. 10,000 commercial views earns me or anyone on YT on average one dollar Since last Sept I made $130 a month on YT with 10,600 subscribers but I have no time to make anything but the most rudimentary and primitive videos.


* Do you have any merchandise for sale? shirts, mugs, car decals, etc which are good for marketing as well as financial assistance. You already have a lot to do so perhaps you could outsource the merchandising.
***No. None of that.


* Perhaps you could have a storyboard for each of the rescue fish you have? This may increase the financial donations.
***Good idea. Thank you. Perhaps for the future. We have something of this kind in our YT videos, but a shadow of what you are proposing. As for donations, we don't get any donations. In the last 10 years, the rescue got perhaps $200 of cash donations from kind souls, $20 a year. I thought of including my email into our YT video descriptions to indicate that we could accept donations by PayPal but chickened out. We are not a non-profit. Self-funding requires us to be only for profit, Corp C. We have no debt though. Everything we have is ours.


* Perhaps you could run some volunteer workshops for keen fish keepers in your local area?
***It'd be fun... if I only had over 24 hours a day and didn't have to open, the sooner, the better It's a cool idea for when we open, it would seem.

* Perhaps you could provide a weekly report on what projects are coming up, how they progress and some of the problems solved.
***I kind of do it via our YT channel, not as systematically as you say though, so again, a shadow...

* Please let us know what we can do to assist.
***Thank you. I really don't know for now. When we open and we could add bells and whistles and need help growing, marketing, etc. then maybe?

Lookng forward to being one of your paying visitors once COVID vacinne becomes available.
***Thank you so much.

Perhaps you can sell some merchandise on youtube like other people. Also start a membership online so people can help you carry a load. A lot of sites have that. $20 a year gets you extra videos that other public people cannot see, that kind of thing. Just throwing ideas out there. It takes time to build a youtube following, but what you are doing is so awesome for the fish community that I believe it should be encouraged.

Perhaps you can sell some merchandise on youtube like other people.
***Thank you. I'd like to try just to see if this is a viable, worthy way but at present, it'd chip away even more time from the actual building. I do have some household junk on Craigslist but this is not what you mean, I know, haha... just jk...

Also start a membership online so people can help you carry a load. A lot of sites have that. $20 a year gets you extra videos that other public people cannot see, that kind of thing.
***I would not buy a membership in my club. Perhaps I personally wouldn't even subscribe to my channel. So, no, I can't do it. Perhaps yet. Until, that is, I learn and have time to make videos worthy of paying a penny for.

Just throwing ideas out there. It takes time to build a youtube following, but what you are doing is so awesome for the fish community that I believe it should be encouraged.
***Thank you so much, my friend. I couldn't appreciate your support more. When I feel down, good thoughts and encouragement from the likes of you help keep me going.

******************************************************

More of the usual drudgery for die-hards haha...