LauraFrog
Fish Gatherer
Ah - you found Jodi-Lea Matheson. She's a regular on most of the Australian fish forums.
If you import bettas from Asia off aquabid here's a breakdown of the fees in $AU:
$30 or so - approximate price of the fish, this varies of course.
$5-10 - transhipper fees within Asia (getting the fish to port)
$25 - transport into Australia, health certification, quarantine
Then up to $60 or so - local shipping from Brisbane to you.
This is PER FISH and it does not reduce much if you buy a lot of them, so you're actually better off buying a few fish unless you are talking wholesale quantities. Jodi-Lea will receive fish from basically wherever you care to have them imported from, and for $25 a fish will handle the transport of the fish into australia, the documentation, licensing, health certification and the quarantine. This includes her transhipper fee. I believe it is slightly less - about $20 - for females and plakats. Then she sends the fish to you by courier and you pay for that.
So if you're willing to fork out that much money, it's not actually that difficult to bring them in. It's just that it costs more than the fish are worth to most people. It increases the price of a nice pair from $40 to near $230.
Jodi-Lea breeds, she's got fish available sometimes. There is a breeder near Cairns who's just moved house as far as I know and does not have fish available at present - I'm hoping to get some off them when they start again because I'm only an hour from Cairns. There's a breeder in Mill Park, Melbourne, concentrating on symmetrical plakats but usually has some other fish available, currently nothing though. Livefish.com.au sells but you cannot see the exact fish you're buying and you can indicate colour preference but that's no guarantee you get it. Also I don't know if I'd trust their ID of a hm or a delta... I mean, there's a lot of difference between a symmetrical gorgeous HM and a rough and ready one with uneven rays.
If you import bettas from Asia off aquabid here's a breakdown of the fees in $AU:
$30 or so - approximate price of the fish, this varies of course.
$5-10 - transhipper fees within Asia (getting the fish to port)
$25 - transport into Australia, health certification, quarantine
Then up to $60 or so - local shipping from Brisbane to you.
This is PER FISH and it does not reduce much if you buy a lot of them, so you're actually better off buying a few fish unless you are talking wholesale quantities. Jodi-Lea will receive fish from basically wherever you care to have them imported from, and for $25 a fish will handle the transport of the fish into australia, the documentation, licensing, health certification and the quarantine. This includes her transhipper fee. I believe it is slightly less - about $20 - for females and plakats. Then she sends the fish to you by courier and you pay for that.
So if you're willing to fork out that much money, it's not actually that difficult to bring them in. It's just that it costs more than the fish are worth to most people. It increases the price of a nice pair from $40 to near $230.
Jodi-Lea breeds, she's got fish available sometimes. There is a breeder near Cairns who's just moved house as far as I know and does not have fish available at present - I'm hoping to get some off them when they start again because I'm only an hour from Cairns. There's a breeder in Mill Park, Melbourne, concentrating on symmetrical plakats but usually has some other fish available, currently nothing though. Livefish.com.au sells but you cannot see the exact fish you're buying and you can indicate colour preference but that's no guarantee you get it. Also I don't know if I'd trust their ID of a hm or a delta... I mean, there's a lot of difference between a symmetrical gorgeous HM and a rough and ready one with uneven rays.
