Ranchu Competition with Panel of Japanese All Japan and Thai Judges

As the judgement of the first round concluded, the grades of the ranchu were separated into A, B, C and D class. For the second round judges, the officials of the show request that all of the photographer provide some privacy and space for the judges to discuss openly thus, I do not have the pics from the second round of judgement.

After the first round the scores are thrown out. The judges will start again with the A, and B fish to see how they will show against each other. There were quite a few surprises and overturn during the second round. As we all know that ranchu are considered on an overall basis, and performance on that day in front of the judge. The distinguished judges have certainly shown that you do need to take all the part of the fish into consideration before rendering the final judgement. The appreciation of show ranchu is truly an art form and not to be taken lightly. I have learned quite a lot from the judgement. The winner and champions are not as transparent as some of us would like to perceive.

The pictures below will be the starting of the second round of judgment and following by the different points and grade given after the first round. As promise I will also illustrate a fish that has been disqualified by the judges during the first round of judgement. You may see from the picture that the defect is really small (small patch of bleeding on the side) but the fish was disqualified, nonetheless.

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Loyalty above all else, except honor.

Now, I would to show some of the ranchu that were given an A grade from the first round of judging of the Nisai Class. The pictures are not in any particular order ok, they simply show the A grade ranchu from the first round of judging only.

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__________________
Loyalty above all else, except honor.

And more pictures of A grade Nisai from the first round of judging.

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__________________
Loyalty above all else, except honor.

More A grade ranchu from the first round of judgment from the Junior class. Please notice the exceptional quality of all the tails of these beauties. Pictures are truly worth a thousand words.

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__________________
Loyalty above all else, except honor.

More A Grade Junior from the first round of judgement.

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__________________
Loyalty above all else, except honor.

More A grade Junior from the first round. The more I look at the A Junior, the more I am impress with the quality of the fish that Thai breeders are able to breed. All the Junior are bred in Thailand, please notice the fierceness as they come at you aight. I hope that they will be able to change some of the misperceptions about the origin of the fish being the major factor in the grading of any fish. Caretaking and breeding techniques are unique and the most crucial aspects to every breeders no matter where they are and they represent the core of the TVR hobby. Fish are beautiful because we make them beautiful, not because they are from Japan. These pictures are excellent encouragement to all of you who are thinking about doing your own breeding where ever you are. You can breed these beautiful babies too, you only have to try and start and learn from your own mistakes and success. As the old chinese proverb goes, even the longest journey will start with the first few baby steps.

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__________________
Loyalty above all else, except honor.

Check out these last Junior A grade. If I do not tell you that she is a junior (small tosai), you may think that she is either a nisai or an oya fish. She is awesome. I will keep an eye on this fish to see the development at the next show. I am sure that I will have the opportunity to see her again. Amazing ranchu definitely. The second fish is the begining of the Oya A grade pictures from the first round of the judgment from the Show.

I entered 2 of my own bred in the Oya Class. One of them receive an A grade from the first round, the other receive a B grade from the first round. After the second round of judgement, my B grade fish were awarded 2 higher placing than the A grade fish. We were really surprise at the final placing of our fish. It truly opened my eye to the Nichiran standard for TVR competition. I learned that you have to trust your own instinct and your own techniques and not the words of your own peers because no one will know your fish as well as you.

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__________________
Loyalty above all else, except honor.

More A grade Oya ranchu from the first round.

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__________________
Loyalty above all else, except honor.