1. Om Poecilia
2. Om Poecilia, Engelsk

Who and what is Poecilia Scandinavia?

Basically all fish keepers or aquarists will get in contact with live bearing fishes at some point in their lives. Amongst the most well known are guppies, swordtails and platys, but there are many more exciting, and at times, rare species.

Poecilia Scandinavia is a Nordic society, which is dedicated to preserving and disseminates live bearing fishes in wild forms.

Purpose
The purpose is to disseminate the knowledge of the live bearing fishes and ensure their sustainability. Many of the live bearing fishes known today are only present as cultured varieties, deliberately bred for colour, fins or shapes. We are not against the cultured varieties but if we in the hobby are to preserve the species as they look in the wild, a society as ours is unfortunately necessary.

What is a wild form?
A wild form is a species of fish, which has a known and defined catch site and time, and which is not bred for specific characteristics or looks.

The desire is to maintain the species as it looks in the wild.

When we in the society emphasizes the need to register the catch site it is due to the fact, that huge geographical variations can appear from location to location, within most species of livebearers.

When a fish is on our specieslist it will be listed with its scientific name, catch site and year it was caught.

Preservation of species and biotopes
We are also participating in dedicated conservation projects for live bearing fishes, which are threatened by extinction in nature due to irrigation for farming, pollution or other reasons.

We are cooperating, amongst others, with a university in Morelia, Mexico, as preservation is now more relevant than ever.

Increase in industrialization and growth in populations forms an ever growing threat in the areas where we find the live bearing fishes.

The story behind the fish

When we are registering the catch site and often also know who caught the fish, and maybe even how it ended up in our tanks, we can say that we know the story of the fish.

This is a story that we gladly tell to other people too.

The specieslist
It is an important tool in the work of the society, and it is based on the members reporting on their fish population. It is a very good tool if you are looking to increase your population of a particular species, or you want to try a completely different one.

The Poecilia Spirit
The society is known for the very positive "Poecilia Spirit" where we with pleasure gives or exchanges fish between members without any money involved.

The purpose of this is to spread the species as much as possible to minimize the risk of loosing the entire species in the society.

Nature vs. cultured varieties
Like we said before, we are not against cultured varieties even though we only works with wild forms. We are against cultured varieties when it leads to inhibits the ability to swim (like for instance the balloon mollies) and even in some cases no or very small possibilities of breeding successfully.

Our magazine: "Poecilia Bladet"
The Society is publishing its own magazine 4 times per year. The magazine is normally 32 pages in the format 6" x 8,5" also known as "A5", and is printed at a professional printer in full colour.

All members of the society has the possibility to be heard in the magazine through articles on fish and not least the members own experiences.

By sharing own experiences you help others to avoid the same mistakes as you made.

Newsletter
Approximately 10 times per year the Society publishes a newsletter. The newsletter is send by email to all members we have on file as having an email address.

The newsletter is to inform the members about everything that happens in the Society, planned events, wanted ads and similar.

Email
We encourage all our members to inform us about their email address if they have one. We consider the email as an easy and effective way to quickly reach the members.

Further information in English
If you need more information, please contact our President.