Selling

Question
Hey! I was wondering on what people are "into" I'm 14 and I decided to start a little business  where I can practically only gain money, not loose. I want to start this to start gaining money for the future...such as car and collage. Well part of it would go to that. In the fish/water animals category, what are people into these days? I was thinking on making a web site with various  fish/aquatic pets to sell. Have any ideas? I was thinking starting small with some fish, snails and craw fish.
This is the UPS animal thing which will tell you of what I can't ship if you are thinking of something else....
Thanks so much!
http://www.ups.com/content/us/en/resources/ship/packaging/guidelines/animals.htm...

Answer
Hi Alex,

It's great to see you are so enthusiastic about fish. I first started keeping fish when I was 18, and I'm still loving the hobby 10 years later.

Unfortunately, the truth is it's hard to make a significant profit selling fish. At the very best, all you can hope for is that your hobby will pay for itself and you don't have to spend your own money on food, supplies and electricity because it will come out of the "fish fund" from breeding and selling fish or invertebrates.

The problem is simple: The fish that sell for a lot are hard to breed and require significant investment. The fish that are easy to breed and don't require much of an investment, don't sell for a lot.

The best thing to do is to have a chat with your local fish store in the area. (Chain pet stores like Petsmart and Petco don't trade in fish, so avoid these.) Just ask them what kind of FW fish they sell a lot of, and what kind of fish they would be interested in buying from you. That way you'll always have a "Plan B" if you can't sell all the fish online and your tank starts getting overcrowded from excess fry.  

The first thing you need to do is make an investment in a breeding tank. (Very few fish will breed prolifically in a community tank.) For most fish that means at least a 20 gallon tank, filter and heater. The best thing to do would be to buy a used one from Craigslist or other local online classifieds - much cheaper that way. If you only want to breed snails and shrimp, a 10 gallon setup would be fine.

Then, you need to read and research A LOT about the fish you decide to breed. There are some very popular fish like electric blue Jack Dempseys, but you need a big tank to breed them - at least 40 gallons. Then there are the egg scattering fish like angelfish. They are a lot harder to breed than livebearers, but it can be done. However you have to get supplies like frozen bloodworms, water conditioners like Indian almond leaves or blackwater extract. And you can only generally breed one species per tank. (This is why some people have "fish rooms" which hold several different tanks: they are breeding several different species.)  

Small fish like cherry shrimp and Endler's livebearers could co-exist well together and both breed easily in a 15 gallon tank. I would maybe try them first. If you don't like those, you could get the easier egg layers - cichlids like kribensis or Bolivian rams. They too, would need at least a 15 gallon tank to themselves.

One of the most profitable things to breed are either assassin snails or nerite snails. Google those if you have not heard of them, they are a hot item these days and you'll see them frequently on forum Buy and Sell threads and on Aquabid and eBay. Unfortunately, nerites only breed in brackish water so you can't keep them with other fish except maybe guppies (which are cheap to breed but sell for cheap). Assassin snails breed slowly, which is why they command a relatively high price.  

I don't know anything about crayfish, but the only kind that would be profitable and practical that I can think of would be the dwarf orange kind. Google cpo breeding - you'll see what I mean. Maybe also Google breeding crayfish - there may be other dwarf kinds that sell well.

Also, take a look at this thread:
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=214771
There may be other threads like that in this forum. Try the Search feature and see what you come up with. Also, if you are not yet a member of Aquaria Central, be sure and sign up...it's a very active forum full of helpful and knowledgeable members.

I hope that helps, take care!
Nicole