KNOWLEDGE, THE REAL POWER STEPS IN

I guess that if someone was to write a descriptive account of who Mike Sipe was at this point of time they would probably see me somewhat as follows:

An energetic and persistent, person who pursues goals, unreachable in many ways, that allows him to both make a living and make changes in the way things are done.

In my history as an entomologist I had opened the first biological control business in the South East and had pioneered the use of natural organisms and methods to control insect populations on a variety of food crops. Dr. Willard Whitcomb, my former major professor and head of the Biological Control section at the University of Florida had once said about me that I had done more than any other single individual to reduce the amount of pesticides used in Florida.

I had made a reasonable income from that company and had been able to assist many farmers in the reduction of pesticide use.

My venture into the business of producing Hybrid all male tilapia was however still on hold due mainly to the resistance of the Game Commission and it now looked like they were possibly going to win and deprive the people of the state of the opportunity to grow tilapia, a fish that was easier to grow and more productive than any previous fish.

I thought a lot over the next week, and Bill called me several times to get phone numbers of the various people up and down the chain of command in the Game Commission. He got the number of Agent X, Mr. Fry, the Commissioner, Dennis Parker, Agent Y, Agent Antifish and Agent Freddy Langford who at that time was the agent in charge of Exotic Species. Bill called each and everyone in the chain of command in the Game Commission and asked them for their opinion on tilapia.

The following Sunday I received a call by several friends who told me to get a copy of the Tampa Tribune, that we were all over the newspaper. I rushed out to the 7-11 and got several copies of the Paper and found Bills article, which was in the Local Section. Not really front page, but still a very prominent position. He had a photograph of a Game Commission Officer, Gun strapped to his hip, carrying a box of tilapia out to put them in the Live Hauler. The Title of the Article was "State Seizes Sipe's Fish"

Another photo showed me looking up at a Game Commission Officer. Bill had devoted the front page of that section and two additional pages to his interviews with the various people in the Game Commission's chain of Command.

One comment made by Freddy was "no species of plant or animal that was not in Florida when the white man came should be allowed and if he had anything to do with it he would see to it that they were exterminated."

This single comment was possibly the one that helped me to finally get some consideration on my permit request.

Freddie's single comment about what was here when the white man came stands as the most stupid comment ever made by a person who believes himself or herself to be ecologically sensitive. Yet this man was actually in charge of the approval or disapproval of new species of plants and animals. In one statement he proved himself ignorant about the vast number of plants and animals that have over the years been introduced into Florida. He also seems to be unaware that well over 90% of all plant and animal crops produced in Florida were not here when the white man came. When Freddy said that he would lead the exterminators in their pursuit of nonnative species, Jan said "be sure to put yourself first on that list."

I was needless to say elated at the appearance of the article and the contents.

On that particular Sunday I had the urge to go smack some tennis balls around and try to reduce my anger a bit and so I decided to go to the Tennis Club that was on the way to my home on the beach. I parked in the small parking area at the Depalmer Racquet Club and went in.

As I walked up toward the Clubhouse I saw Ed Price, Jr., he said to me. "Hi! Mike. Would you like to be my partner for a doubles match, we need a fourth. I said sure, I would like that. Ed said "I see you have a little trouble from the boys, meaning the Game Commission Officers and the Commission itself" and I answered what do you mean and Ed said " I read the article this morning in the Tampa Tribune. But, lets play tennis now and you come to see me in my office on Monday morning and we will talk about it.

I guess my anger was helpful since Ed and I beat the other tennis players in our set of doubles that day.

I did not say anything to Ed about the Fiasco with the Game Commission that day, but I was steaming with intent when Monday morning came around and I gathered all of my correspondence which showed the potential of the tilapia as a new farm crop and the records that Dennis had brought me and everything else I could think of that I could show to Ed to help explain my problem with the Game Commission, put them in my car and drove to his office.

When I got there he was on the phone and I said to his secretary that Ed had asked me to come in to talk about the problem I was having with the Game Commission. The secretary said for me to bring all of my materials in and set them on Ed's desk. I did and soon Ed got off the phone and came back to his desk. He held up his hand and asked me to give him a minute to look at the materials. So, I let him read for a while and made sure he saw the copies of the letters and correspondence that Dennis had brought to me. After about 30 minutes or so Ed turned to me and said "Mike, it looks like they have really been mistreating you and I will have a talk with the boys and will get back to you in a couple of days.

I left his office with mixed feelings, I did not know if he could influence any one in the Game Commission or not. I knew from people I had been talking to that Ed Price was on the governors Breakfast committee and head of the Democratic Party in the local area so I had some hope but was not sure what to expect next.

Then I got a call from Dr. Fry the Game Commissioner himself and he said to me that he wanted to make an apology to me and that my permit would be in the mail that afternoon. This was on a Tuesday and sure enough the Permit arrived in the mail on Thursday and I could not believe my eyes. I was permitted to work with t. hornorum, T. mossambica, and t. aurea and hybrids of these fish.

So, I had the right facility to work with the tilapia, a permit from the State Game Commission that allowed me to work with the fish and no fish because the Game Commission Officers had taken them all over to Boca Raton and put them in holding.

So, I called Dr. Fry back and asked him how I could get my fish back and he said I should just call Officer Antifish and ask him to bring my fish back or to arrange to have them brought back.

So, I called Officer Antifish and told him that I now had a Permit from the Commissioner, which allowed me to work with the fish, and I asked him if he would arrange for me to get my fish back. I had assumed that since they had taken the fish from me and hauled them all the way across the state that they would put the fish back in the Live Hauler and bring them back. When I asked Officer Antifish If he could arrange to bring my fish back there was a silence on the other end of the phone and he responded that I could have my fish back when hell froze over and then only over his dead body and God himself could not get him to do this, Jan was meanwhile yelling that that could be arranged, and then Officer Antifish hung up the phone.

I then called Ed up and told him what Officer Antifish had said and Ed said that he would get back to me. About an hour later the phone rang and I picked it up and Officer Antifish growled at me that I must know God himself and I could come and get my fish but it would not do me any good because when they came he had made sure that they were all mixed together and he know that I would not be able to use them to breed hybrids now.

I was a bit shocked to find out that all of my efforts had been ruined by the actions of Officer Antifish, but I went ahead and made plans to go and get the fish since without the fish I did not know how I was going to move forward in my efforts to make the tilapia hybrids available to farmers.

The next week I rented a u-haul truck and got together some tanks and some bottled oxygen and a few friends and headed over to Boca Raton to get my fish. Officer Antifish was not there when we got the Facility where the tilapia had been dumped, but another Officer showed me where the fish were and got some nets and help to load them into our truck and I headed home with the tilapia.

When Dr. Hickling said that they were hard to separate once they were mixed together he could not have been more right. I stared at them for hours and examined them but could not be sure whether I was putting the t. hornorum in correct tanks or whether they were t. Mozambique and at that time we did not have electrophoresis available to us, so there was really no way I could be sure and we ended up having to kill the whole batch of tilapia which by then was several thousand fish of varying sizes.