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May 4, 2013, 7:00 p.m.

Saturday, May 4th, Mike Hellweg of St. Louis will give a presentation on the information in his book "Culturing Live Foods", covering all the commonly available live food animals and their easiest culture and harvest methods.

Mike has been breeding fish since he was 9 years old. Over the past 40 years he has specialized in miniature fishes, and has bred numerous “oddballs” including licorice and chocolate gouramis, almost half of the known wild Betta species, two species of “Kuhli” loaches, hillstream loaches, wasp catfish, bumblebee catfish, banjo catfish, seahorses, pipefish, miniature fishes from several fish families, and nearly 400 other species from 30 families of fish (only about 50 of which are cichlids!). He credits his success to culturing and feeding an assortment of live foods daily for feeding his breeding stock and for growing the fry of these diverse oddball fish. Mike has documented many of these spawning successes in more than 200 articles published in hobby magazines around the world, and has had two books on live foods published by TFH Publications.

The event will be held at 1125 Plant Sciences Laboratory, 1201 S. Dorner Drive Urbana, IL 61801.  Doors open at 6:45 p.m. and will remain open until 7:00.  Enter through the eastern most door on the north side of the building. Meeting starts at 7:00 p.m.  Free parking in the lot on north side of the building.  The event is free and open to the general public.

Fieldtrip to Shedd Aquarium - May 18th

The shed aquarium trip will be May 18th.  We will leave at 7a.m. from the Plant Sciences Lab building, which should get us there just after the aquarium opens.  Ticket Prices are available online at http://www.sheddaquarium.org/ticketprices.html.  You are responsible for purchasing your own ticket.

The behind the scenes tour costs $48.95 and includes a 50 minute guided tour behind the scenes with the animal care staff as well as entrance into everything else included in the less expensive packages except the 4-D experience.  If you wish to take the tour, purchase tickets for the 12:30 p.m. tour.  

For those with a smaller budget, general admission is $8.  However, if you'd like to see the special exhibit "Jellies" or the Aquatic Show,  you'll have to get the Shedd Pass for $28.95 and add another $3.00 for the "Jellies" and $4.00 for the Aquatic Show.

Some packages are available online to purchase ahead of time.  You will definitely want to do this if you want to go on the 12:30 Behind the Scenes tour.  Some packages can be purchased at the door.  Some packages are more expensive if you wait until you arrive to purchase your tickets.

Parking

We will be carpooling but expect to pay $22.00 per vehicle to park.  Some parking lots will only accept cash.
 
Lunch

We'll decide as a group what to do about lunch.  There is a place to purchase food at Shedd.  Depending on what time we leave to come home, we may stop for supper on the road.
 
Please RSVP to Brian Stearns ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ) if you are planning to go.

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