Peoples Opinion

[Simian]

Hey all.

Here in the Waikato Aquarium Society we are looking to move venue's to something a tad more comfortable, along with this comes the question what would people want from the meetings.

I have my theories on what people would be into but would like these confirmed.

I especially want to hear from non FNZAS forum members, what would get you off your butts and along to a meeting once per month.

Perhaps you could give feed back on the following.

Availability of refreshments, meals, espresso coffee, licensed venue

Time of the week, is the weekend suitable in today's world or would a weeknight be better?

On site aquarium/s essential, desirable, not important?

Table shows? Would you be willing to bring along your fav fish for all to see?

For sale table, people bring fish/plants/stuff along to sell/exchange

Social aspect of the meeting

Technical advice aspect of the meeting

Learning about Judging standards, showing fish etc

Guest speakers

[Barrie]

dont know if this is helpful or not but

Im a bad meetings person as I am an early riser and when a meeting goes on for ages it cuts down the time available for shut eye... Meetings should be early.

A wide range of things will get my interest going and there fore the topic should be veried.

A friendship is probably the best way to get people to want to be there and involved and things like a dinner out (weekends?) and trips away on gathering and craws may well help to develop friendships?

[Simian]

All feedback is helpful

[Tsarmina]

another fun idea is an auction night, as opposed to a table.

everyone brings in their items to sell, club get a small percentage.

[tHEcONCH]

Speaking as an non-FNZAS and non-club member I would suggest doing lots of social things that bear only a loose connection with fish keeping. Why should fish club be only about fish? Have a JAWS DVD night. Go and see some wierd arthouse movie. Go to a cafe for coffee and a chat. Go to the Rugby (of course if you live outside of Canterbury your team will probably lose, so maybe that's not such a flash idea). Drink beer. Have a wine tasting night. All the fish-speak will flow readily enough anyway because its a common interest and when it doesn't you'll still be able to socialise. Basically do things that you could take your non-fish obsessed partner to.

[davidb]

Go to the Rugby (of course if you live outside of Canterbury your team will probably lose, so maybe that's not such a flash idea).

Didnt the Crusaders loose to the Highlanders (the third to bottom team in the super 14) on the Weekend? Just putting it out there :lol:

[tHEcONCH]

We Mainlanders have an over-developed sense of charity sometimes

[Caryl]

Kapi-Mana have great go-kart nights 8)

[Ira]

Unless I've missed one(Which is very possible) there's been a grand total of one in about the last 3 years.

[David R]

I agree with conch about the non-fish related stuff, sometimes its good to do stuff like that just to socialise a bit more.

But as for the meeting, my general thoughts would be to keep the official [boring] stuff to a bare minimum and cut to the chase with an interesting guest speaker, slideshow, whatever. I'm bordering on leaving another [not-fish-related] society because of its long drawn-out meetings, run by a bunch of old retired people who still like to pretend they are important. The first half of the meeting consists of the president and the secretary droning on about nothing in particular, then there's a way-too-long interval/cup-o-tea period for all the oldies to socialise, then finally you get to hear the speaker. Keep the meetings short, punchy and to-the-point and you'll be right.

BTW, do people actually catch their fish and bring them along to the meetings in a bag/jar/bucket to show everyone?!?!!!

[livingart]

Local bird club used to have a judging night set up

where some small tanks and fish were setup and people invited to judge them

then were shown how they might be judged at a show, easier to do birds in cages opposed to fish in tanks

the clups success depends on how driven the committee etc are

and being able to find common ground between the tea and bikkie brigade

and the youngies

[Caryl]

Finding appropriate guest speakers when you live in a small town can be difficult.

When our club first began, and we had a large membership, we had a sales table. Didn't have to be aquatic and a percentage of the sale went to club.

We also had a table show. Each meeting we would select a different class or group of fish to be entered and this would be mentioned in the newsletter before the meeting so members knew, for example, that this month's show was for "livebearers", "barbs", "pairs" etc. Members brought their fish in small Critter Keepers or jars. The room was kept warm so heating wasn't a problem.

We also ran a monthly raffle. Each member brought a food item to go in the raffle and the winner took the lot. The raffle paid for the hall hire ($8 a meeting) with more left to bank.

We have had demonstrations of tank landscaping, how to set up a specific type of tank, tank building/repairing, filter maintenance, plant care, and once did a demo on how to change the diaphragms in the air pumps.

Another interesting evening was when we handed all members some empty film canisters and asked them to bring them to the next meeting with a water sample from their tap, and samples of water from their tanks. They were also told to bring any pH test kits they had. We then compared the readings and the test results. We had new kits, old kits, and very old kits. We had test strips, drops and electronic meters. It was interesting to see we got the same readings from all the kits so pH kits are accurate, no matter how old! The electronic meter we used was highly accurate and recently calibrated (borrowed from the local salmon factory). It was also interesting to see what a wide range of pH tanks were, and how the same species of fishes were being kept in widely differeing pH's, and all doing well, despite what the books said their pH prefernce was.

Guest speakers can be difficult. Try a local MAF person, if you have one, or whoever on the council is responsible for control of pest plants. You might find that a number of members also have another interest in common. Get a speaker on that topic. Our local MX5 club realised the majority also had 4WDs so one of our runs was a 4WD trip through the Mangatapu Ranges.

Got a local mini golf? As mentioned, Kapi-Mana went Go-karting. A local aquarium? Paintball. Anyone able to organise a team game indoors? Bowls, netball, cricket etc.