How to purchase SPS

[bradreef]

Time for a new thread.
Rules:
1. Dont name any person/business in a negative way or even slightly.....We dont want it here.
2. include pics.
3. follow rule #1


Ok To start a new thread. There are many different options today when buying SPS coral. Stores have (wild colonies, aquacultured colonies, frags that are local, Ora frags, fragged rtned corals). What do you want to buy. First of all every one is a coral that can do well in your tank. I have purchased every type and had different experiences with all. Right now I either look for really nice frags or nice aquacultured colonies.

First off lets talk prices.
Local
Wild colonies- usually come in small, med, large, show sizes. prices can range from $40 for a small to $300 for a nice show.
Aquacultured- These usually range from $50-$100 and sometimes more.
Local frags- usually from $20-$35
ORA frags-from $30-$70 for the ora tort or other top end
RTNed frags- same as local frags

online
wild colonies- same and some times slightly less for cherry picked
Aquacultured- some places a little higher and some a little less
local frag- Oregon sets the trends but the prices are from $20 to $1000000
Ora frags- available at a few online places like etropics but about the same as stores.
rtned- depends on where but usually a good price.

Second, What to buy
I like to start with the aquacultured because of the size. 1 they are bigger to start with and will be a good colony within a year. 2, they haven't growth into a form yet like wild colonies so they can adapt to your flow. Now I know some people that only buy frags because they like them to grow in and others that wont buy them because of all of the bad stuff out there. Both are good reasons and are valid. It all depends on what you like. If you want to collect the most rare frag then buy frags but others like the shape of corals and need to buy the large colony to fill that big spot in there tank.


Coloring.
Well you could spend a ton of money and buy the most colorful corals out there and end up with brown sticks. It is going to depend on nutrients and light to keep the color. So when you look online at a deep blue coral ask yourself if you reef can really keep that color because chances are you have some coral in their right now that aren't as bright as they could be. The other thing to remember is that most places take top down pics because the corals look a ton better. The blue coral the you thought you were buying is really blue tipped with brown branches. still a nice coral but not what you thought. When I look at aquacultured colonies I look at what color are they going to be in the end. Sometimes you can tell and others you are wrong. For frags just look at where is came from and adjust for you lighting.

Pests. 1 of the big things I am personally concerned about. soo much going around out there and people just dont care until they start seeing problems. Red bugs are super common and my tank is bug free at the moment. some people just dont quaranteen there new coral and then a year later when there coral is doing so so they cant decide whether they want to use interceptor or not. If you quaranteen you wont have to worry about it. interceptor, iodine, flatworm exit. all easy to use. after you aclimate let the coral float for a couple hours in interceptor at a good strength. Some online stores have it posted that they treat there systems and others dont know about the problem. Some people just dont care because they still sell coral and it cost money to treat there tanks. Dont name out places that have them here but take it upon yourself to ask more questions when buying frags and look closely. The only way I can see bugs is with a magnifying glass.




As for places I have had experience with. In the seattle area everywhere except I haven't been down to tacoma but hear good things. I love Reefermadness and they have first cherrypick from walt. Azcoral has looked like they get some good stuff and have seen there coral in a few peoples tanks. kevinpo is one of the best people to get frags from and has a ton of coral at good prices. Right now would be a great time for him to ship to you also. I have seen fragfarmer frags that are colorful. I always incourage people to go to frags.org because they are free and it is a good place to find coral.

Ok guys and girls. your turn but follow the rules.
Where have you had success? What do you like out there.

 

[spongebob lover]

Ok i have to say that this is a great thread and thank you for all the info this is gonna help me next time i buy my next coral .
Now i have to give thumbs up to Blue Sierra because they are very helpful i mean no joke everytime i go there i come home very happy

 

[bradreef]

I like blue seirra. Cy is a great employee and has been working there for years. A while ago he also got rid of their red bugs.

 

[big t]

First rule of SPS club, don't ever talk about SPS club.

Second rule of SPS club, don't ever talk about SPS club.

Hehe. I have sourced SPS mainly from picking up dying pieces from my LFS. I had my tank pretty well stocked, but not anymore after the move. This time around I am going to search out some of the nicer and higher color pieces. So brad, how are you doing after the move?

 

[CarlaW]

My tank was stocked out of a store in Spokane, can you guess which one???
I will keep going back there until he gets sick of me!!!

 

[jlehigh]

Great job on this Brad... Very applicable information.

::I SEE BROWN CORALS::

I want to put emphasis on being able to see the corals from the side view and not the top down unless your tank sits on the floot and is only 12" deep (I'm exagerating..)

I have had corals turn from brown to purple and others purple to brown. I find that the corals with very light coloration tend to be more difficult to hold the coloration. I stay away from anything with cream colored or white-ish stalks with colored tips. For some reason the zoox quickly turn the light tones into brown in my tank.

Local frags are great but be preparred to be PATIENT!! At 1 inch of growth per month it will take a 1" frag at least 2 years before it is a 6 branch colony with 2" branches not including the time it takes to "base-out". (Green Slimer excluded )

As always.. Find out the origin of the specimen and it's environment wether it be in the Ocean 50' down or in 6" of water in an aquaculture facility under 400 Watt 20K MH's.

 

[middletonmark]

Local frags are great but be preparred to be PATIENT!! At 1 inch of growth per month it will take a 1" frag at least 2 years before it is a 6 branch colony with 2" branches not including the time it takes to "base-out". (Green Slimer excluded )

As always.. Find out the origin of the specimen and it's environment wether it be in the Ocean 50' down or in 6" of water in an aquaculture facility under 400 Watt 20K MH's.

Couldn't agree more with this last point, but about the first ...

Great thread Brad!

I love frags. I treat with interceptor and inspect for other pests as a matter of course.

But this is my first Acropora, mailordered from a reefer I heard of through online friends [some of who new him personally].

The second photo is taking it out to frag, 16 months later [3-4 of those with red bugs]. Beautiful coral, I've actually now seen it on exoticreefs for much higher dollar than I got it for

No doubt, frags require patience. But provided you're not getting a under 1" piece [doesn't have to be that much bigger, but I tend to think 3/4" Acro frags can be a joke as they're requiring a much longer growout IME than a 1.5"] ... a good year and it's suprising the colony you'll have.

 

[mojoreef]

Yea buying coral has changed alot, even just over the last few years. First off what they call aquacultured are truely not aquacultured, not even close really. With the exception of ORA perhaps. Most of the aquacultured corals you see now days are pretty much where they send out the divers to collect the wild colonies and the chop shop them up and mount them to bases and then put them in the shallow waters of lagoons until they base out and color up, few months at best.
Most people fragging the corals out of their tanks are alot closer to aquaculture then that.
In the old days you used to just inspect the coral for health and damage, color didnt matter (as you an change it). Now days you have to worry about alot of pests, and not only from folks fragging but also from wholesalers, lfs and so on. I dont think any are immune anymore. Red bugs, bad algae, flat worms, nudis and so on are pretty previlant.
Also in the old days we used to joke and bug eacch other about quarrantine tanks, we all said we did it, but truely no one really did, lol. Now days I think its a brutal thing not to do it to all critters. The cost alone of all things reefs dictates its a bad thing not to.
The one other thing is the fancy names and or illegal corals. The trend over the last year or two is that everything is a limited edition, or has someones name attached to it or is illegally collected and sold for crazy prices. Yes thier are corals that you wont see but maybe once or twice in a lifetime (purple monster comes to mind) but most all corals (sps) will color up just fine by making adjustments to nutrient levels and lighting.


Good thread Brad


Mike

 

[bradreef]

I have seen tanks with common corals that have colored up that would blow away many tanks with the collection of Limited edition frags. Not to take away from those corals but sometimes you are paying for good marketing. Some of these corals are truly spectacular.

 

[dgasmd]

I have to agree with Mike here. The whole concept of aquaculture is great, however, all the exporters and so called "farmers" did was turn the few colonies into a chop shop. You still get wild collected corals that come with even more bad things than the average untouched wild coral. Most wild collected corals don't ahve the nasty algae growing on them that the "aquacultured" ones ahve because of their location. They still are just as suceptible and their colors will change too, but now they give you the gifts of pests, bad algae, and lack of variety. I mean, if you look at just about every site, they all have the very same corals. Some more colorfull and smaller/bigger than others, but the very same corals still. There is hardly any variety. Very little "true" wild collected corals for sale anymore and the places that have them are wanting to rap you in broad daylight for it.

The name thing is another topic altogether. That truely irritates me to no end and I culd go on for an hour here. It is so retarded and has completely ruined a hige aspect of the hobby in my opinion.

 

[middletonmark]

Yeah, mariculture/aquaculture is warm-and-fuzzy on the outside - yet in many cases likely exactly what you're talking about

And likely the same risks [loss, pests, brownout, lack of adaption to aquaria] as `wild'.

Very unlike hobbyist-frags, which at least have proven to survive/thrive in aquaria. IMO, that's about the only difference between hobbyist vs. ocean corals - they're not further evolved in our tank to handle aquaria - they've just proven to survive and grow in aquaria [and likely be colored nice enough so that someone wants to trade for it ]

Or overhyped little twigs whose market value has been maximized. Still Acropora, likely to brown or die if it decides to - and probably the most variable market of all ... with tiny frags requiring 3 years to be a colony costing an arm + leg [and yet popular], yet at a frag swap/club large ones can come for much cheaper than online + for a larger frag [that becomes something sweet in a year].

But I know what you're saying ... it seems like the Acropora shipments we see have only a couple `unusual' sort of pieces in the last good while, the rest [while lovely] seem like the same players I see elsewhere [and every shipment].

And the recent spate of cheap `Marshall Island' ORA frags at the LFS here don't impress me either. Lovely, but very different than their `true aquacultured' corals which at least here are priced differently/more. The two I traded frags to the LFS for `act like wild corals' IMO ... little 2" wild coral branches. While I love a couple of their `normal' corals I have, this new cheap MI frag thing I dunno about.

As always, just opinion ... but too interesting a discussion to sit on the side of.

 

[reedman]

I think a key to remember on buying SPS corals is that pricing is set by us, the buyers. If we don' t spend $100 a frag for a LE or "rare" frag, then it will come down in price over time. Further, if we as hobbiests continue to raise, frag, trade/sell our nice corals the big-boys will also come down in price (to an extent....they do have to make a living).

Also, watch the total price when buying online. What I mean is some places have moved to pricing corals low and making it up in artificially high pricing on the shipping. In the end you may end up with a higher total price.

Finally, if you have a good experience with a vendor or store, share that with others. The best compliment a store gets is a referal. And the best research you can do is to as others that have first hand experience with a vendor (be it an online vendor or a LFS).

Great thread Brad!

 

[mojoreef]

With the fragging of wilds all the collectors have done is exactly what they saw happening here and else where. They saw a seller buy a coral from them for 25 bucks, then take the coral and chop it into 50 frags and sell each one for 20 bucks. Great concept, the only thing that changed is that they do it now prior to getting here, cant blame them for that, also they get to charge you shipping on the chink of concrete that the frag comes on.. Its always been about the shipping costs, the exporters make their money via they box. not whats inside. They make 30 bucks a box, you ship a 100 boxes you make 3 grand simple math, who cares whats in it. Thats why you here LFS always complaining about adds on. "I ordered 10 corals not 5 with 2 blue ring octos and 3 crabs??? then they ship it to a trans shipper who get the box with 20 items in it and they turn 1 box into 2 boxes with ten things in it, now they can charge $10 for a box charge, $10 bucks for new water, heat pack import fees and so on. Now they make 40 bucks a box send a hundred boxes they make four grand. Its a beautiful thing.

On buying corals specially SPS the best way to do it bar none is when you go to the LFS, You get to inspect the coral for damage, health, pests, making sure its gone through the acclimation period and so on. Price does not pertain as much as if you buy 4 online and it once again goes through shipping you might loose 2, then how much did you pay. The problem their is that most LFS don't see this, and thus don't pursue getting in a large variety for folks, (some do) and then some charge so much they drive folks to online.
Now I am not saying online is bad, it can be great. If you can develop a relationship with an online company it can be the same as viewing it up close and personally. All you are doing is using the online vendor to be your inspector. Now if the online guys would approach it this way they could be great (some are) take care of your customer, work with them, have a little give and a little take and everyone walks away happy.

Mike

 

[NaH2O]

Great info!

I wanted to chime in regarding pests. Quarantine is important - I was lucky enough to have my QT ready to go for an acro colony and some frags. Not many red bugs, but it only takes one with a brood pouch. After the subsequent interceptor treatments, I discovered something else on the colony - all corals are staying QTd until I figure this one out. I did manage to save the acro crab, and it is happily living in my fuge in a container.

Don't get me started about the names either. Jlehigh - the brown corals you can call: Ultra Chocolate Love Acros - rare! . Doesn't take much to market.

 

[dgasmd]

Ultra Chocolate Love

Oh man, am I going to famous now. I got boat loads of "Ultra chocolate love" :badgrin: :badgrin:

 

[Maxx]

Oh man, am I going to famous now. I got boat loads of "Ultra chocolate love" :badgrin: :badgrin:

Abusing the reader. Penalty. 15 yards.

Alberto, I told you the pic of you showing Mike your butt was just wrong....but this.....ewww....I feel dirty now.

JK.... Alberto

I've bought both frags from local aquarists, and what were alledgedly aquacultured corals. I had to frag several of the "aquacultured" ones and curently have the ever popular red bugs in my tank presently. Interceptor is on the way, and a Q-tank will be used for all future additions. No if's, and's, or but's...if it goes in the tank it gets QT'd.

Great thread Brad. Good info folks....

Nick

 

[jlehigh]

Jlehigh - the brown corals you can call: Ultra Chocolate Love Acros - rare! . Doesn't take much to market.

Right on!! I've got dark and milk chocolates!

 

[SueT]

And don't forget the "white" chocolates..... of old times....

Great thread Brad and all.

 

[Maxx]

Just out of curiousity, those of you who quarenteen corals....how long do you keep them in QT?

Nick

 

[bradreef]

I just blast my corals with chemicals for a few hours. Calfo said you should quaranteen for a month. both ends of the spectrum.