Please welcome our newest sponsor, AquaFinn. Below is a little background on it’s founder, Paul Curtis and a basic overview of some of the products that Paul has developed for the aquatics industry.
The owner/biologist of AquaFinn is Paul Curtis and his experience in the aquaculture field dates back over 20 years. He has specialized in many biological aspects of fish culture over a varied group of species. Paul began his career working with salmonids and developing reproductive techniques for improving gamete storage and fertilization. Paul then spent the next 17 years managing fish hatcheries developing techniques for rearing hybrid striped bass and white seabass larvae intensively in a hatchery situation. In order to be successful in these endeavors, all aspects of production including nutrition and fish health were addressed. In conjunction with AquaFinn Paul operates an aquaculture consulting company AquaSolver LLC.
In the over 20 years, Paul’s experience has encompassed many facets of fish culture. In the development of techniques for rearing larval fish, he developed novel new diets to improve nutrition for species through his research, determining requirements in order to improve growth and survival. Nutrition is one of the fundamental requirements for successful culture and with the many new emerging aquaculture candidate species, understanding potential requirements is essential. Paul also was integral in the development and execution of fish health and disease management and reproduction programs. Paul’s expertise lay with the biological aspects of fish culture but has also extended into culture system design and installation. Paul was also an associate instructor at Saddleback College in Mission Viejo, CA where he taught Introduction to Aquaculture, Aquatic Animal Disease and Health Management and Water Quality classes.
AquaFinn was born from experience in fish disease and health management. Both the aquaculture and companion fish industries were seeing the old products for disease control being removed from the market due to toxicity and carcinogenicity issues. Products like malachite green and formalin mixtures were banned many years ago for use in food fish and have been disappearing from shelves in pond and aquarium shops, thus the need for something new, environmentally safe and non-toxic. To date MinnFinn is available for controlling external pathogens such as parasites, bacteria and fungus in was little as one 30 min treatment with no water changes once it is neutralized. Also available is MedFinn medication utilizing Romet, one of only three antibiotics registered with the FDA for use with fish. The FDA gives specific instructions for the dose and duration to use, giving the best chance of an effective treatment and minimizing antimicrobial resistance.
AquaNerd will be releasing more information about the AquaFinn product line in the coming days and weeks.
