ACA ZOOMED SPEAKER PROGRAM

Juan Miguel Artigas Azas is a naturalist living in San Luis Potosí, Mexico. Although his main interest is Central American fishes, he studies and is drawn to many other species and locales, as well.

Juan Miguel has written many articles on Mexican and Central American freshwater fish for several publications. He has also been honored with the invitation as lecturer in fish oriented conventions in several countries, including Australia, Belgium, Canada, England, Germany, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, France, Italy, Sweden and the United States.

Pam has been a tropical fish enthusiast for years and cichlids are her passion. Pam loves to travel to see cichlids in their native waters. She is proof that you do not have to be a diver or a photographer to have fun chasing cichlids. With many trips to both Lake Malawi and Lake Tanganyika she enjoys sharing stories about these Cichlid Safaris.

​

Pam is a founding member of “Babes In The Cichlid Hobby” where their goal is to make a difference in cichlid keeping. By raising money for Cichlid Conservation and Cichlid Research (Over $150,000.00 to date).

She believes conservation is a must, and works as an advocate for cichlids at risk. In her own words, “Conservation is all about awareness and education.”

Josh Cunningham has been keeping and breeding African Cichlids for almost 20 years. He started with African Cichlids from Lake Malawi and a couple from Lake Victoria in a 400 sq ft basement. He then moved to a new house in a different area (with a bigger basement). He was without cichlids for a couple of years but then acquired a 55 gallon tank and multiple tank syndrome kicked in again. He expanded on some different species and kept a few tanks on the main floor of his house. At this point, he decided he wanted a fishroom in the basement, designs were made, tanks, and fish were purchased and a 'Fish Alcoholic" was born. His fishroom today has 94 tanks ranging from 15 to 180 gallons and in total is over 5,000 gallons.

Willem Heijns Willem is a retired bank manager and has been keeping cichlids for well over half his lifetime. He started with the firemouth (Thorichthys meeki) and subsequently has been hooked up with Central American cichlids ever since. Having had small tanks at first he moved on to build his "Cichlidarium" containing two 600 gallon aquariums and some smaller ones. After some major calamities (two 600g tanks exploded almost in his face) the Cichlidarium was finally closed down in March 2011.

​

His talks include:

• Belize, searching for cichlids

• Central America, breeding cichlids in the home aquarium

• Heroine cichlids: an addiction?

• My Cichlidarium, a personal history

• Nicaragua, searching for cichlids

• Cichlasoma, rise and fall of a cichlid genus

• México, a journey into the world of cichlids

Lawrence Kent currently lives in Seattle, United States, where he maintains 30 aquariums filled with African cichlids, catfish, killies, and tetras; Southeast Asian labyrinths; and self-collected native fish.

​

Lawrence works for a charitable foundation supporting projects fighting hunger and poverty in the developing world. Lawrence takes advantage of his travels to look for interesting tropical. He has collected and photographed fish in 40 countries, mainly in Africa but also in Asia and Latin America.  Lawrence also has a strong interest in freshwater fish native to the U.S. as well. He has collected native fish in Mississippi, North Carolina, Alabama, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington.  He keeps his native fish tanks in the garage, which is cool.

​

Lawrence is a much sought after speaker and has made presentations in 22 cities in Africa, Europe, the U.S., and Canada. Also a talented writer he has written articles for Tropical Fish Hobbyist, the Buntbarsche Bulletin,  DATZ, American Currents, and Amazonas, where he works as associate editor.

Does talks on Lake Malawi Travelogue and Aulonocara.

Speaks about Tropheus (Are they really that scary?) and is an Official Speaker for the C.A.R.E.S. Preservation Program.

Rusty Wessel resides in Louisville, Kentucky, USA, where he maintains over 11,300 liters (3,000 gallons) of freshwater aquariums, predominantly containing species of the family cichlidae, which he successfully raise and breeds.

Rusty has taken his hobby to a point where he has successfully collected fish from the countries of Belize, Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico, from 1983 to the present, for a total of 26 trips to this date. A beautiful and elusive cichlid discovered during one of his expeditions to Honduras was named by Dr. Robert Rush Miller, emeritus professor of the University of Michigan, after him in the June 1996 edition of Tropical Fish Hobbyist magazine, Theraps Wesseli.

Rusty is as well a prolific author and photographer, and his writings or photographs have appeared in wide distribution specialized and prestigious publications, like Aquarium Fish Magazine, Aquarist & Pondkeeper, Buntbarsche bulletin, Cichlid News, Ad Konings' Cichlids yearbooks, Freshwater and Marine Aquarium and Tropical Fish Hobbyist.

Mike has given programs at ACA and BCA conventions, as well as to local, regional, and international fish clubs on the various aspects of collecting, identifying, keeping, and breeding dwarf cichlids.

Hailing from Manitoba, Canada and a passionate naturalist, Biggs is the quintessential aquarist as well as sought after judge, speaker and auctioneer. With his deep concern for conservation, expansive knowledge base and love of sharing his expertise with others, not to mention an all-around wonderful human, he brings an extraordinary evening to any aquarium society.

Jim Cumming hails from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada and is a lifelong fish hobbyist, having been involved for over 50 years. Other than a fifteen year sojourn into the world of killifish (his online moniker is ‘notho2000’), he presently keeps mostly Central and South American cichlids, but he devotes about one-quarter of his 40-aquarium fish room to Madagascan cichlids and the Etroplus genus from India. He has given several presentations on Madagascan cichlids and their plight.​ Jim has also had extensive collecting experience in Mexico, Belize, Cuba, Brazil, and the southern U.S.

​A tropical fish hobbyist for over 6 decades, Peter specializes in East Africa Rift Lake and Victorian cichlids. He has been involved with over 30 imports, from Africa and Europe, and continue to focus on bringing rare and unusual cichlids into the North American hobby community. Peter is committed to conservation, both in nature and in the hobby community, and currently serves as the ACA CARES Coordinator. He is also the CARES Specialist for East African waters except for Lakes Tanganyika and Malawi.

Spencer has had a lifelong passion in keeping and handling tropical fish since the age of 3. He owns and runs a wholesale / retail tropical fish operation The Afishionados Incorporated. Which

currently is approaching 50 thousand gallons of aquariums.

​

He has been active in aquarium societies since the age of 12 and on different occasions leading three separate ones. His passions for fish have led him to collecting on four continents and

spoken at countless amounts of Aquarium clubs.

After 11 years of useless university education, he is a fantastic fellow to have along for a night of trivia. Some of his other passions include hockey, Star Trek, golf, BBQing, Lego building and

short romantic walks along the beach.

Over the years of keeping Lake Tanganyika cichlids John has photographed both his own and his friends' fish. In his presentations he shares these photos along with his experience keeping these fish in the aquarium.​

​

His talks include:

• Lake Tanganyika Cichlids

• Keeping Lake Tanganyika cichlids in the aquarium

• Diving with Lake Tanganyika cichlids

Does talks about Dwarf Cichlids, Lake Victoria Cichlids and his travels to Lake Malawi and Lake Tanganyika.

Speaks about breeding New World cichlids, DIY fish keeping, large catfish, cichlids in Florida.

A 13-year combat veteran who found fish is sharing his education and story by inspiring fish keepers old and new in these fun and informational talks. He brings a different approach with excitement and vigor that only he knows.