Fish Shops in Belgium

The first thing to remember about visiting shops in Belgium is that many of them close either all or half day on a Wednesday. So it does not make good sense to go at 8am on a Wednesday morning hoping to visit a few shops that day and more the next! The only shop we found open on the Wednesday was Aqua Discus in Wavre. This shop as do others, specialises in Discus. They carry an immense variety of colours etc. – not much use when you have little or no interest in Discus. They also had a number of tanks of 'Bread and Butter' fish all in clean tanks and good condition.

Our next shop was also in Wavre situated on the Chausee de Louvain about 2 miles out of town. The HISTOIRES D'EAUX is located in a large industrial unit. In the entrance, they have a fine display of aquaria for sale. The fish room has about 500 large aquaria for coldwater, tropical and marine fish. I have rarely seen a larger collection of guppies. They had so many varieties – snakeskin, cobra, swordtail, half black, flame tail to name a few. All were in superb condition and were good value for money. Our purchase included Danio kyathit (the really spotted species), Danio Hikari Yellow and Blue and some Corydoras gracilis. Their plant section was very comprehensive and we purchased some really nice pots of Cryptocoryne balansae. Each pot contained at least six plants and was very nice for the sum of €7.05 (£5).

From Wavre, we travelled up to AQUARIUM NEON at Lokeren. Lokeren is situated between Ghent and Antwerp. This shop, as with others, closes between 12 and 1.30 pm. That gave us time to indulge in lunch at an open air pub in the town square. The shop again has a selection of aquaria for sale in the entrance. At the back of the shop is a large fish house with probably in excess of 300 tanks. All tanks were clean and fish in good condition. We spent some time wandering around the various isles looking at fish before making up our minds on purchases. Staff there, were very obliging and allowed us to select each individual fish we wanted. Some superb examples of Crenuchus spilurus (my all time favourite fish) were available and were soon sorted onto bags. Nice Nothobranchius palmquisti, Aphyosemion striatum and Aplocheilus linneatus were among other fish purchased. We bade farewells to the staff there and headed off to AQUARIUM DISCUS in Ostend.

Aquarium Discus also specialises in discus but also has a good selection of other fish including Marines and Cold water fish. Not as big as either of the other shops, it still has probably around 150 tanks. As ever, tanks were spotlessly clean and the fish looked to be in good condition. We made a number of purchases including some very nice Nannostomus marginatus.

Leaving Ostend, we headed back down to Calais for shopping and thence to the Sea Cat terminal to complete our little excursion.

Well worth the time spent at the shops and something we will certainly consider doing again (but NOT on a WEDNESDAY!!!!)

Useful Information

Aqua Discus. Chee de Louvain 92, Wavre.

Histoires D'Eaux. Chee de Louvain 473, Wavre.
info@ histoiresdeaux .be

Aquarium Neon. Hoogstraat 9, Lokeren.
www.aquariumneon.be

Aquarium Discus. Stenenstraat 16, Ostend.
aquarium .discus@ pandora .be

Other Shops not visited

New Brussels Aquariums. 39, Boulevard Barthelemy Brussels.

Aqua-Home. Chee d'Alsemberg Brussels.
www.aqua-home.com

We would like to thank Mr Walter Boehling of Dover for providing a copy of the Belgian 'Yellow pages' and for the benefit of his prior visits to the shops.

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