My name is Steve Saunders and I have been breeding livebearers on and off for over 50 years.
I knew Dr Joanne Norton as a friend and was one of the original members of the group. I
did many of the fish illustrations seen in the first few newsletters.

Hello Steve,

My name is Darrell Mefford and I joined the ALA during the mid 1980's.

Up until a couple of years ago I specialized in Fancy Xiphophorus. I am still fairly active on this forum even though I am currently not breeding or keeping any Swords or Platies.

I have seen your work because shortly after I joined the ALA I purchased "Fishes of the genus Xiphophorus" which contains some of your work.

Hi Steve!

I'm Alex Barnes and I joined the ALA back in '06 (At 11 I was probably the youngest member at that time). I currently have been working on some Xiphophorus strains, trying to get them as deep orange-red as possible while keeping their tails yellow and black.

I also keep 2 saltwater show tanks with 4 Moorish Idols (my oldest is about 4 now) in a 500 gallon beast and 1 stonefish with a snowflake eel in a 55 gallon tank.

Hiya Steve, I'm glad you stopped in. It's always fun and educational to pull up a chair with a veteran.

Hello Steve,

It's wonderful to have you show up here, Steve. I remember reading your articles in the old Aquarium magazine throughout the late 60's and early 70's. I joined the ALA, as a kid, a couple of months after it went public in 1972 and remember your drawings quite well. It has always saddened me that your widetail veiltail mollies (people forget that you not Joanne originated that strain from Wood's) were allowed to disappear from the hobby - as well as the whole original Wood's strain. The Far East "guppytails" must be another mutation as they are missing too many of the Wood's characteristics. I am also sad that the Imperial or Astro Swords were also lost. I only saw them once but they were a fantastic looking fish. I'd love to know more about your experiences with the widetail veiltail mollies and what you know of John Wood's work with the originals. I have often wondered if the widetails were the result of Wood crossing latipinna into his original shenops strain as your original green widetail veils looked more latipinna than shenops. Wood once mentioned he was doing that about the time frame when you got them from him. I had them from Joanne in the 70's. It would be interesting to hear about the creation of the ALA from you since you were part of its founding. On line you might want to check out Dr. Roy Levine's hi fin swordtail webpage. He is doing the kind of work you and Joanne did - extraordinary fish. Also the "miamiswordtails" site, as Karl is doing great work with hi fin swords using the new Chinese "sailfin" sword line - wide long perfect dorsals.

Robert

Steve,

Why haven't we heard back from you???

It's funny, we were discussing the "Imperior Swordtail" on this forum a while back and of course your name came up.

Are you currently working with any fish???

Darrell

Hey everyone. I have a lot to tell you and will very soon. I will explain my absence and my work with fish over the years. I hope it will be interesting reading. It is a lot to put down in text and I hope I can provide some pictures too. Please stay tuned.
Steve Saunders

Aloha Steve!

My name is Shane Furuta and have been playing with fancy livebearers for a few years now. It is amazing to see you on here! Around 10-15 years ago we were trying to find out if you were still around. I am looking forward to hearing your stories about the Imperial Sword and Veil Mollies. I can remember Glenn Takeshita telling me how beautiful they were, it's too bad he's no longer around. I'm sure that he would have been excited to hear from you...

-Shane

I have uploaded some pictures. Hope you enjoy!