As everyone probably knows by now Michelle and I are fish fanatics.
Apart from keeping fish one of our passions is to build up a huge
database of fish photos (See
fish-photography.info) and we knew about Trimar having seen their
ads in Practical Fishkeeping magazine and from their own website. We
hoped that we would be able to get permission to take some photos in
the shop especially having seen their stock list.
Our
first impression was that Trimar was much smaller than we had imagined
but every inch of available space was used to its absolute maximum
plus a little bit more, there are even overhead tanks, although I dare
say the shop assistants dread anyone buying a fish from these tanks.
The photo on the left shows one of the overhead tanks at Trimar
Photographing the fish in this shop wouldn't be to easy either due to
all the close reflections and high up tanks. The high tanks in
particular would be a problem because it is much harder to avoid a
reflection from the flashgun when looking up to an aquarium than it is
when viewing from above.
Trimar is a shop for the real enthusiast with a fantastic range of
fish from the trades bread and butter species right up to the truly
exotic species.
As luck would have it our good friend Bob who is a local and who
frequents Trimar on a regular basis had a chat with Monty the
proprietor of Trimar about our visit and struck a deal where we could
take some photos and let Monty use a few of them on his own
website, this was great
news. As I side issue I noticed that there were some small male congo
tetras in Trimar and these were very tempting to me because my own
group of congo tetras all turned out to be female - all seven of them.
But because we were on holiday I couldn't buy them there and then so I
arranged to pick them up on our way home.
Anyway we made the arrangements when we would go to take the photos
and Bob decided he would pop along too. Unfortunately my health made it to difficult to walk or stand for any length
of time so I set my camera up for fish photography and sent it for Bob
to use ( which he did and to great effect too).
Altogether a great number of photos were taken and some were magazine
quality, unusually almost all the photos taken were usable which means
the first thoughts we had about it being problematic in Trimar were
completely unfounded. Bob loved my camera after struggling with less
able models for a number of years which goes to prove that the
equipment in photography is as important as the man (or woman) using
it.
The photo on the right shows Bob in action with my camera:
Canon 400D camera with an EF 60mm F2.8 EF-S Standard Macro USM
AF Lens and Canon 580EX II TTL Shoe Mount Speedlite flashgun.
With so much material available Both
Bob and Michelle spent several hours at Timar despite the fact that
this was our last day in Cornwall. After taking a photo of just about
every fish in the shop several times over Michelle, Bob and some of
the Trimar staff chose some good, young male congo tetras and packed
them as they would when sending fish via courier so that they would
have a safe journey home.
I'm
happy to report that all four male congo tetras made it home safely
even though it was a long 400 mile trip. Knowledgeable staff and good
packing can make all the difference. At this point I must say a big
thank you to Trimar because they wouldn't take any money for those
fish and they were great - Thank you.
Here is a video clip of the Congo tetras showing them as youngsters
shortly after getting them home and as they are now - all grown up in
to fine young adults.
Here is just a very small selection of the photos taken at Trimar
Our
first impression was that Trimar was much smaller than we had imagined
but every inch of available space was used to its absolute maximum
plus a little bit more, there are even overhead tanks, although I dare
say the shop assistants dread anyone buying a fish from these tanks. 
