The story

The fisherman who never fishes

Seven hours fishing. No fish. Just a shrimp that ate the bait.

Some Fischers catch fish. Others just have the surname.

I belong to the second group. Fischer is my surname, and at some point I decided I should finally live up to it. So I bought a fishing rod, a hat with far too many pockets and wellington boots that have still never got wet. One Saturday morning in April, I stood on the bank, cast my line and waited.

For seven hours. No fish. Not even an interested one.

When I reeled in the line, there was no perch on the hook, but a tiny, bright red creature with ten legs and the confidence of a customs officer. It had eaten my bait. All of it. And it was looking at me as though I was the problem.

That was my first dwarf shrimp. I took her home, because you cannot just throw back an animal that looks at you like that. At home she got a jar, then a small tank, then a larger tank, then a second room. Today my flat has more aquariums than furniture. My neighbours think I run a laboratory. My mother thinks I need help. Neither is entirely wrong.

What I learned along the way

Neocaridina shrimp make better flatmates. They clean, they do not argue, and they come in red, blue, yellow, orange, green, black and patterns that look as though someone opened a tattoo studio for crustaceans. They do not need a heater, a filter with three motors or a doctorate. They need clean water, patience and someone who will not put them in a tank with a fighting fish.

Since then I have kept shrimp privately, for fun and with no intention of making money from them. Nothing from my private tanks is sold. Garnelenfischer has no shrimp stock or commercial breeding operation. What I built from the story is a free marketplace where Swiss breeders can offer their captive-bred shrimp.

Why Swiss-bred shrimp matter

You can order shrimp from Germany. They are often cheaper there, that is true. But they spend four to seven days in transit, pass through customs, attract import VAT and were raised in water unlike yours. Animals from a Swiss breeder on the marketplace grow up in water from the same kind of tap as yours, and the journey to you is correspondingly short.

Garnelenfischer itself neither sells shrimp nor breeds them for sale. “Swiss-bred” in a listing is always the individual seller's own declaration, not something we have verified. What Garnelenfischer does sell directly is imported Japanese food, which I also use in my private tanks. Chaotic Shrimp is in development and will launch only when it is actually available.

Die Chefin

The first shrimp, the bait thief, is still called Die Chefin. After all those generations, I cannot say whether she is still alive. I claim she is anyway. Every tank has one that gives me the same look.

So I am still Fischer. I still have not caught a fish. But I have my private tanks, the marketplace where breeders offer their animals, and the food I use myself.