To celebrate its 70th year, Bradford & District Aquarists’ Society designed this special trophy for the Best in Show at its event on November 12.
WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY: DR DAVID FORD
It wasn’t a Golden Arowana that won at the Open Show but a Southeast serpent loach, Serpenticobitis octozona, owned by the Brown family of Preston AS.
Held on Remembrance Sunday, at the Bradford Academy, there were 242 entries in the 37 Classes. The winning loach received 86.6 points from the three Yorkshire Association of Aquarist Society judges via YAAS rules.
The next important award at this event is in the Pairs Classes. The Best Exhibit in this class was a pair of North American Rainbow shiners, Notropis chrosomus, with 86 points, belonging to John Hetherington of STAMPS (South Tyneside Aquatic Marine & Pondkeepers Society). Again, a special 70th anniversary trophy was awarded.
The Open Show also included an Auction with over 100 visitors bidding for the 22 lots of aquatic items with auctioneer Steve Jones of YAAS.
As part of the celebrations there was a projection display of the members, their fish and past shows, especially the aquatic tableaux that used to be built in past exhibitions. This was shown on a screen all day long. It was interesting to see members looking at this screen, reminiscing and even taking photos (on their iPhones) of ancient photos that were once slides, now digitised and displayed. Not all 70 years though — that was before technology!