AN AQUARISTʼS JOURNEY Story and Photos (unless noted) by Rosario LaCorte
Chapter 7
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to contact Schultz by telephone. We searched the e departed for São Paulo after a few days telephone book only to be disappointed; there was no in Rio. The flight was rather short. Upon Harald Schultz listed. What to do? Axelrod suggested, arrival, we hailed a cab and headed for “Why not send a telegram? Perhaps he will contact our hotel, which was very clean and in a good area. us.” I reached into my wallet and removed the address We had no contacts to take us collecting, so it was a given to me by Alan Fletcher. Now the suspense— shot in the dark as to what we were going to do. We would he be available? Would he come to our hotel? relied on one contact, Harald Schultz, to make our In due course stay successful. The Harald arrived and name Harald Schultz contacted us. His English first came to me during was excellent, which was my attendance at the a relief to us, as none Pet Trade Show, which of us spoke Portuguese. was an annual event The reason we had been held in the Hotel New unable to find a phone Yorker. Jay Winter number for him was that was the chairperson of there was a seven year the event. Each year “waiting period” there to I looked forward to get a telephone. this show, for many That evening prominent writers and Harald had an professional fishkeepers gathered there. Harald From left to right: Larry Konig, Harald Schultz, and Rosario LaCorte circa engagement to present a 1959 in front of Larry' s fish house. Harald visited the US and spent the program to the German Schultz’s name came day at my home. Club on a tribe of Indians up on a number of with which he was closely associated. It was a pictorial occasions, and all of us were under the impression program, presented entirely in German. Neither I nor that Schultz had written an in-depth book on Brazilian Herb’s wife Evelyn understood a word of German, fishes. No one had ever seen the book; it turned out to so it was difficult to stay awake, but Axelrod and Ulf be a rumor that all of us believed as factual. understood German and were able to enjoy it. Shortly before we made arrangements to go to We rode to the German Club all crammed rather Brazil, the New Jersey Aquarium Society, of which uncomfortably into Harald Schultz’s Volkswagen I was a member, had Alan Fletcher, Editor of The beetle. After the program we were taken to Harald’s Aquarium magazine, as a guest speaker. I had made home, where he showed us his collection of fishes all of the arrangements for his appearance, as well as collected in the state of Matto Grosso. It was the having taken him out to dinner prior to his presentation. first time we had seen the wimple piranha Catoprion Upon our return to my home, we discussed the mento, or the black phantom tetra Megalamphodus upcoming trip to Brazil. Earlier I had told Axelrod megalopterus (now Hyphessobrycon megalopterus) about Harald Schultz, whom he’d never heard of, and with positive identification. It was a wonderful array I mentioned that upon our arrival in Rio we would of fishes none of us had ever seen. No one knew the contact Schultz by phone. In my conversation with names of any of the miniature tetras. The one tetra Alan I mentioned the trip to Rio, and Alan told me that stood out was M. megalopterus, but at the time that Schultz did not live in Rio, but in Sao Paulo. I no one knew its name. I had brought Fowlers 4-part asked Alan if he could forward Schultz’s address to volume of Brazilian fishes, given to me by Carvalho, me prior to our departure, and he said he would do so so I was able to identify megalopterus by the drawing the following day. in Fowler’s book. It was a pretty good rendition of As it turned out, Alan had been corresponding the fish, and my assumption was correct (I must say with Harald Schultz for quite a while. Harald, a though, that line drawings are not generally a good wonderful photographer of fishes and native peoples, way to identify fishes, as they are often not accurately was an associate curator of the Paulista Museum in detailed). I asked Harald about possibly getting some Sao Paulo and an ethnologist, which is the study of of these fish, and he said I could have specimens of all indigenous peoples. Once we had reached our hotel of them. He was extremely generous. and made ourselves comfortable, the next step was Modern Aquarium - Greater City A.S (NY) September 2014 25