Visit to Wholesale Tropicals.

[MatsP]

I work in Central London, and it's only about 3 miles from where I work to Wholesale Tropicals. But this was my first visit to this shop.

I was quite impressed with the stock. I saw several Syno species that I had never seen before - in all I estimate that they had some 8-9 different speceis.

There were also an assortment of Loricariidae, such as Ancistrus species (most of them with neither L-number or species designation, unfortunately - that is probably how they came from the importer/wholesaler, so I don't really blame the shop for that), an interesting looking "Peckoltia" that I thought might actually be one of the smaller Panaque species. I believe there were three different variants of Panaque nigrolineatus, and I also saw two beutiful

Leporacanthicus cf_galaxias(l240)

. There were also some Hypancistrus species, such as L66, L333, L262 and I think one or two more. One tank had several Farlowella acus, another had Pseudohemiodon laticeps.

There were several tanks of Corydoras, many of which I had never seen before. I can't remember any of the names, I'm afraid - I do remember seeing albino C. sterbai. There were also a few of the larger Callichtyiidae species - from memory, I saw: Megalechis picta, M. thoracata, Dianema longibarbis. I walked home with two Callichthys callichtys.

They also had a few tank-buster species, which I don't wholly agree with:
Auchenoglanis occidentalis (aka Giraffe cat).
Megalodoras uranoscopus
Phractocephalus hemioliopterus
Acanthicus adonis

I also saw some Asian cats that I can't remember the name of, and what I believe was Tatia intermedia (no label on the tank tho').

There was also a bunch of other interesting fish, both the "usual" and the "unusual" types.

And most of the labels are scientific (albeit occassionally outdated) names, rather than common names.

Overall stock was looking well fed, healthy and "happy", and prices were, in my opinion reasonable.

If you are ever near central London, make it one of the stops!

--
Mats

[worton[pl]]

Hey,

It is just great! A dream! In Poland for many years I hardly have seen any new, interesting species of catfish :/. Maybe a very few loricariidae.

Sounds like good reason to visit London hehe . Is there a law that prohibit getting fish out of UK?

And I believe Tatias come from Southern America btw ;).

[Richard B]

They always seem to have something of interest & yes prices seem reasonable. As i went not too long ago stock seems quite different so it seems the turnover of cats is quite high, which means good variety for us!

Mats - do you remember what species the synos were?

[MatsP]

Sorry, do not remember species of Synos (I should have brought pen and paper, and/or camera).

I don't think there are restrictions with regards to fish transport within EU - you may struggle to take a bag of fish as carry-on luggage due to "liquid restrictions", but that's a different story.

--
Mats

[Bas Pels]

no restriction against liquid in the luggage exist

in fact, many people just put the fishes in the luggage, it is not really heated, but will keep a bit warm due to contact with the warmed passengers room

[MatsP]

And I guess as long as it's packed in a transport box (usual fish shipping styrofoam box), it will be no worse than in the back of a car for the same amount of time in cool climate.

--
Mats