KOSH Aquatic society

I was about 12 when I managed to save up enough to purchase my first tank and a few fish, it was the start of a journey of filled with highs and lows, but always with passion. I remember that there used to be fewer pet stores than there are now, however, I also remember that they generally seemed to have healthier, better looking fish, than what I see lately whenever in many of the stores.

I recall that quite a few people, who were always ready to assist, and help out in any way they could, who saw the hobby as something bigger than themselves, and helped purely for altruistic reasons, simply to assist a fellow enthusiast. It seems this is no longer the case, and I am not alone in this observation.

With this in mind, a bunch of like minded enthusiasts, largely through the drive to do so from Wilfred, started an aquatic society for our area, with the primary and overriding aim of accomplishing one major thing, the expansion of the hobby, and not just within our immediate vicinity, but countrywide. And by expansion we mean in quantity, and quality, this is our end goal, it is what we strive for, to bring back the days when breeders, hobbyists and variose experts all treated one another with mutual respect, and worked together creating something which was not about ego’s or bragging rights or profit, instead it was done simply for the love of this fantastic hobby, and the community of which we are all a part, it was something with a pure purpose.
KAS, an abbreviation which we hope may one day change lives of many hobbyists for the better.

The KOSH Aquatic Society. We meet monthly to make decisions on how we are going to steer this new organisation of ours, to see in what ways we can improve the hobby, thinking globally, but acting locally, and as always, to share stories and information, and experience (a priceless of commodity).

We have started a forum, which though still in its infancy, has started to grow nicely within the last few weeks, and also getting some notice from outside the country especially, which is perhaps telling, in that thus far we have received more interest and help from individuals and clubs/organisations in Europe and North America, than we have been able to get within our own country. And we are as ever grateful to our foreign supporters, as much of what we would like to accomplish would be difficult, if not impossible without the great amount of assistance and networking which they have made available to us.
We have a charter, helping to remind us of why we are doing all of this (besides the pure love of the hobby). And it governs the bulk of the decisions we make, every notion is tempered with the questions, is this going to be good for the hobby as a whole? Will this assist in advancing and growing the hobby positively?

We have decided to list the following as our goals, which will assist in governing our actions and decisions.
1. Promote the hobby.
2. Educate the Public.
3. Assist Members.
4. Communication of trips to Gauteng etc. to combine buying and transport.
5. Creation of a Website/Forum for the Society. (Done)
6. To promote diversified breeding to have a large base of different species.
7. To develop marketing and sales for fish bred by members. Keeping rules 1-3 in mind.
8. To minimize costs of the hobby to members.
9. To invite speakers to meetings.
10. To do field trips to members to look at their setups. (On invitation only)
11. To bring new and exciting 'things' to meetings to look at and discuss. I.e. equipment, ideas, techniques.
12. To invite interested people to meetings.
13. Database of Fish.

We also set up a few rules to more easily facilitate decision making
1. All decisions will be adopted by means of a 60% majority vote.
2. A quorum of 70% of the members must be present at any meeting taking decisions and implementing decisions.
3. Procedure to allow new members into the Society:-
-The interested member must attend three meetings.
-The interested member will not pay fees during these three meetings.
-After the three meetings, the members will vote on letting the interested member into the society.
-The introducing member will not be present at any votes regarding this membership, neither in the beginning nor later on.
-The new member will start paying fees at his first meeting at the beginning of a month after his first three meetings, once admitted into the society.
4. Meetings will take place fortnightly. (Changed to monthly for the time being)
It all sounds a lot more serious than it truly is, the meetings have a casual, and friendly atmosphere, with every ones ideas and opinions being accorded due respect, everyone has a voice, and valuable input to give.
We welcome anyone who is passionate about this hobby, or who just wants to find out more about it, or learn more. We value the new beginner just as much as those with years of experience, as even the greatest of trees, began as nothing more than a tiny seed, and we cannot ensure a continued good future for the hobby without investing in those we will hopefully carry it into the future.
The sub forum for the KOSH aquatic society is hidden to those who have not yet become members, and logged in, once this is done however, any information on the meetings and doings of the society, is visible.