By MIKE CORN

mcorn@dailynews.net

QUINTER -- Each day, Bob Humphrey ambles down his basement steps to check on his herd.

Miniature cattle they're not.

Instead, Humphrey watches over dozens, if not hundreds, of tropical fish. His herd is contained within rows and rows of aquariums. Never mind that southern Gove County is anything but tropical.

That doesn't faze him at all as he breeds different colors of fish to get just the right combination pet shops might like.

You know Humphrey is big into fish when he points out something as simple as a bag of fish food.

"This is how I buy it," he said, "5 pounds at a time."

The pump that forces air into the aquariums is huge, capable of handling up to a number of tanks, all that he has in fact.

"One pump does the whole thing," he said.

He even went so far as to use PVC pipe to pump air around the basement, with valves dropping down into tanks where fish are swimming.

"And I'm bleeding off air," he said.

That extra air might be routed out through a pipe into a stock tank out in the yard, where he might keep goldfish.

In three months, he said, a 1-inch fish will be 11âÑ2 inches outside

"Just like the farmer who knows how many acres it takes to raise a cow and calf, I know what size aquarium and how long it takes," he said

The difference, however, is the turnaround time.

"I can do three generations by the time she has her calf," he said, comparing cattle to the fish he raises.

In his basement, Humphrey manages 50 aquariums, amounting to 1,300 gallons of water. They are of various sizes and are used for different purposes.

In one "pasture," Humphrey has a tank of platys, fish he hopes to breed.

With the German blue platy, he put a red platy.

"The first generation looks like it will be red with a good sparkle to it," he said.

He was working with swordtails.

"I'll take them out and work with first generation to get yellow and black a little bit," he said.

Humphrey said it's nothing to have 50 babies every six weeks.

"And they are $1 apiece," he said. "I raise them up much like a cow-calf operator."

Humphrey isn't a cow man, instead moving to Gove County from Des Moines, Iowa, to be closer to his daughter. He gets a chance now and again to help with the landlord's cattle operation.

"So I'm beginning to learn cow talk," he said.

Humphrey has been in the fish business "on and off" since 1971.

"Each time we move, and this is the third, I sell off the majority of the aquariums," he said.

But he knows the tricks of the trade, using orange pot scrubbers in some aquariums to provide shelter for babies that are in danger of being eaten. Duckweed helps to keep the water temperature down.

Humphrey sells his crop to pet stores in Colby, Garden City and Great Bend, as well as Kearney, Neb.

"What I'm not doing is I'm not making a lot of money here," he said. "It's more for the enjoyment of it. I enjoy the peace and quiet of coming down here."

There are not-so-pleasant moments as well, however.

"Occasionally, when I'm cleaning tanks and siphoning water, I get a mouthful of good old yucky fish water."

That doesn't deter him in the least.

"This is a hobby that's keeping me out of the business of chasing somebody's else's wife," he said, laughing.

Instead, he's chasing his wife, Emmy, as they collect M&M mementoes together.

They both are fans of the items, traveling to their home state of Iowa for an M&M picnic, or traveling to a convention where the trademarked items overflow.

Their rural residence is chock full of M&M items, on the walls and most of all in an upstairs bedroom.

There, M&Ms rule.

And yes, they've even got an M&M van they use to travel to related events.