The show will be August 2-3, 2008 - UMKC's second show!

Over 70 fish were entered last year, and results are available on the club website so you can take a look at what to expect. There were some nice live fish vendors, including Koi Acres who was a corporate sponsor and Southwest Koi and Goldfish. There was also a day of free seminars ranging from filter design for ponds to fish health from a local aquatic vet. I'll post this year's seminar schedule as it becomes available in the coming months.

Bachman's Greenhouse
6010 Lyndale Ave S
Minneapolis, MN 55419

Judges have been announced:
- Ray Jordan
- Bob Brudd
- Candidate Judge Peter Ponzio

More details will be forthcoming on the Upper Midwest Koi Club website: http://www.umkoiclub.org

If you're thinking of attending from locally or out of town, I'm arranging a more goldfish-oriented sideshow in conjunction with the show. It will include a field-trip to Goldfish Utopia where Ed has offered to host a BBQ for us fish nerds, and other activities to be determined. It is being mostly organized with another forum, but I wanted to let Koko's members know they are welcome as well - Koko said it would be okay to let you all know. If you're interested in joining us, please PM me so I can make sure you get details as we go.

The show gets discounted hotel room rates in the area. And the goldfish party will have a bus of some sort for portions of the weekend to ferry us around.

sounds like alot of fun

The UMKC show is coming up fast!

Bachman's
6010 Lyndale Ave S.
Bloomington, MN
Aug 1 - 4 PM - 8 PM
Aug 2 - 9 AM - 5 PM
Aug 3 - 10 AM - 2 PM

If you're nearby, think about stopping by, or spending a day. Free admission, and there's a nice cafe on site for lunch.

There are _fantastic_ free seminars Saturday and Sunday, including:
- a talk about goldfish from Peter Ponzio and
- a session on fish health from Amy Kizer, DVM (vet to the Mall of America aquarium and fish specialist at Southview Vet, Hosp.)
- a talk by Kaz Takeda, talking about his life in the koi business (and maybe he'll sneak in some ranchu stories?)
- judge Ray Jordan talking about how to select young koi
- Sunday at 10:30 AM the judges will do a walkthrough talking about how the koi were judged and answering questions
Full seminar schedule: http://umkoiclub.org/Images_Main/KoiShow/0...Schedule_v2.pdf

We're expecting over 100 koi entered in the show, so there will be a lot to see. Koi Acres, Southwest Koi and Goldfish, and Kloubec Koi will all be there with live fish for sale. Lots of hard goods vendors as well. The show is graciously hosted by Bachman's nursery and greenhouse at their big 6010 Lyndale Ave S location, so there will be lots of gardening to see as well.

There will also be a raffle for a wide variety of prizes donated from show supporters, from pumps to koi clay to food and more.
An auction for koi will be held on Sunday, with fish donated by club members and donated by Kodama Koi Farm!

Full details: http://umkoiclub.org/htm/08Show/2008Show.html

I would love to have a good number of goldfish lovers there to build support for including some goldies in future shows.

Who's coming to visit? I've also got a secret stash of video clips of everything in stock right now at a few of the local stores that carry goldfish, right on down to knowing where to find a sakura wakin, so if you don't shop in the Twin Cities much and want to go fish-hunting crazy just lemmee know and I can post them.