Dr Sven O. Kullander

Dr Sven O. Kullander, Senior Curator, Department of Vertebrate Zoology, Swedish Museum of Natural History PO Box 50007 104 05 Stockholm, Sweden Telephone: +46 8 666 4116 Telefax: +46 8 666 4212 E-mail: ve-sven@nrm.se

Dr Sven O. Kullander, 27 October 1996 in Stockholm receiving the Akvariet's Award (Akvariet's Oscar — a plate with a hand-painted picture of an Astronotus ocellatus). This is an award that is given to people who contribute great work for the hobby. It is given by the Swedish magazine Tidskriften Akvariet, the oldest aquarium magazine in the world (founded 1927). The award was presented by Peter Karlsson during the annnual celebration of "Akvariet's Day".

To aquarists working with the American cichlids, Dr Kullander is highly respected for his work. Of course there will always be some disagreement between scientists or differences in points-of-view, as it will be among aquarists. But, since I know Dr Kullander personally, I know he is very thorough in his work. He does not do any "left-hand work". Even I have thought that the work with something I was waiting for took a long time, but again this is how he works. Everything is done well, and there is nothing for an amateur to say otherwise. He likes to avoid errors he would regret later. So just look at all the papers he has.

And this is only some of his major work. 'A Revision of the South American Cichlid Genus CICHLASOMA (Teleostei: Cichlidæ)' 1983

A book that turned things upside down that we had taken for certain. For me it meant that many of my lovely "Aequidens" were no longer Aequidens, but Cichlasoma. The second book he published was even better, 'Cichlid fishes of the Amazon River drainage of Peru', 1986.

The third book came in 1989 and was written together with Han Nijssen. Its name was 'The Cichlids of Surinam', 1989. I can only recommend these books to aquarists working seriously with South American cichlids. You will be amazed by all the information you will find in these books. Of course you won't find breeding behaviour and things like that, but descriptions of the fish, size, shape and distribution just to mention some of the information you will find.