A GOLD-FISH TOWN.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 246, 17 October 1929, Page 23

A GOLD-FISH TOWN.

CUBIOUS JAPANESE INDUSTRY BIG EXPORT FILLIP. Increasing demands on the part of Great Britain, America, Frattce and Hawaii for Japanese goldfish "Kingyo" hare given this little-known industry a tremendous fillip during the last few years. In Japan a small town is entirely given over to some 15,000,000 "fishy inhabitants. Three hundred human families tend their glittering needs. Yatomi-machi, goldfish town of Japan, lies on the banks of the Kiso-gawa River, and the fact that the Kiso-°awa frequently flooded the country, spoiling the rice fields, has been responsible for the ever growing prosperity of the town since 1883, when the idea of goldfish breeding for export was first introduced to the despairing rice farmers by a visiting merchant, who saw in the disaster of the oft-recurring floods a new source of livelihood for the townspeople. Since that time Yatomi-machi claims ta supply 70 per cent of the total exported goldfish. Last year Japan exported 600,000 kingyo to Western- countries. America is ea'id to import them to an extent of £10,000 annually. Mr. Tsunegoro Hirai. one of the goldfish kings of Japan, declares that only about one-third of the number exported arrived safe. Others die on the way because, of ignorance in handling. jEingyo fanciers can pay high prices for their stock, the "Ranchu" costing as much as £20 for one small fish; the "Oranda" costs at least £13, while the ordinary little goldish, such as the children of the West know and love, cost no more than twopence each. It is only in Japan that one begins to realise the infinite variety and beauty of the goldfish. Some have huge filmy tails like court trains. Almost every street corner has "a kingyo seller, the bi" , stores exhibit a fine collection on their roof gardens, and no little "paper house" in the flowery land is complete without a few of the gleaming, darting "water butterflies."