SeanF

That is the problem with zoos to many things can hide in the polyps and never be seen. We freshwater dip them when they come in to get all the creatures out.

I had to move them into a different place in the tank to get a picture of them so hopefully I will be able to get one tomorrow.

Yeah I have lots of slightly different red rimmed variations. I was about to tell Miles that the safecrackers are ready to frag but hadn't come up with a price on them yet. I will be compiling a photo show of some of them a little later today after I check on the price I can get on your pumps.

That is one nice wrasse

There is some salesman ship to selling online. The key to continued sales is accurate photos but even then depending on what lighting someone has they will always look a little different. I have sold to a lot of people with power compact lighting that complain after they get something that it doesn't look the same as in the photo but when you are talking a couple of power compact bulbs versus a few 400 watt metal halide bulbs there is going to be quite a difference. However if you go shopping on e-bay you can see lots of people that are photoshop happy. It is pretty easy to recognize by the background colors or by the general hue of the picture. The problem is that most sellers are more interested in getting the maximum amount of money out of one sale versus getting lots of sales from a happy customer.

Most of the things that people consider fungus in the aquarium are actually bacterial infections. The bacteria cause a white growth around the area and that is what most people think is a fungus. I know an icthyologist that deals in aquarium fish and he once told me that he had never actually seen a case of a fungal infection in an aquarium.

Furan is Nitrofurazole I believe which is an antibiotic.

The last batch of Seachem Reef Salt that we recieved also had Magnesium levels down around 900. Reef Crystals has been testing good on this last batch we recieved. My personal favorite is still Red Sea Coral Pro.

Stacys pic is of a Nerite snail. There are different coloration from different location I believe that one came in from Bali. They are definately pretty cool.

I don't quarantine my fish per say but I do keep all of my fish in a coppered system so after a few weeks they will be free of parasites and all of my invertebrates are kept without fish in the tanks. So if you wanted to hope that things stuck around long enough to actually be there yes you could buy from me and not have to quarantine anything but things don't usually stay here that long.

I did have another customer that had a bucket of Seachem that he was experiencing the same kind of problems. He picked up a bucket of Red Sea Coral Pro and has done a couple of water changes with it and things are stabilizing nicely. Hopefully you two will have the same results once you get a couple of water changes into it and things will turn around.

This is going to sound horrible but just add salt to the tank. Salt Creep is a wonderful sealant. Hey I never claimed to be a good plumber I just do it all the time.

They are terribly poor shippers in my experience but if you do happen to get one in good shape they do pretty well. From my understanding they come from fairly high up in the reef and like lots of good turbulant water flow and high oxygen levels. I think this is why they don't do very well in transit.

ORA might bring a higher price but I am betting the ones the good doctors are selling also came from ORA. They just don't like to advertise it. They would rather pass things off as doing it all themselves.

If you want to elminate ich from you tank the first step is that you need to get all your rock in the tank and keep the tank free of fish for 30 days. Then any fish you are going to put in the tank need to be kept in a qt tank that is medicated preferably for 30 days also. My personal choice of anti parasite meds is copper but for some species you would need to use something different.

Then here is the step that most people don't have the set up to do. Every invertebrate that goes in the tank needs to be kept in a quarantine free of fish for 30 days. This means every snail, crab, coral so on and so forth. This last part is the killer for most people. This means you have to have a tank that is well enough established to support that acro frag you just bought for 30 days before you can put in the main tank.

I would like to dispute the fact that all tanks have ich. I can be successfully eliminated and through proper quarantine and medication procedures you can keep it out of your aquarium. That being said most people won't do this.

I once had a guy joke around with me and ask if I had a candy cane coral that was pink with purple polka dots so I said sure here is a picture.

That exposure to air thing is the biggest myth about so many things in this hobby. Clams can be exposed to air it is not going to hurt them. Do you think that the collectors haul them out of the water in bags and the wholesalers aren't bagging them in the tanks that they are in. I actually had Walt Smith come out when I was down in LA and they had just gotten a huge order of clams in and I was trying to be careful around all of the new clams and corals and he came out and I asked him the procedure for getting things set aside for me and he asked what I was interested in hauled it out of the tank walked half way across the warehouse with it and put it in another tank. If you left it setting out on the counter for 30 mins or so it might not be good for it but there are a lot of places that recommend pulling out baby clams to put them in a bowl of water for feeding. I have heard the same myths about linkias, gorgonians, sponges. I even had a stupid customer come in and tell me that he wouldn't by an acro frag from me if I pulled it out of the water while bagging it. That one I couldn't resist telling the guy exactly what a moron he was. I pulled out a book that had a picture of a reef at low tide and asked him if he thought that all of those corals were going to die.

Actually grazer have a longer digestive tracts than carnivorous fish. It is just because of the foods that they eat that they have to consume food a lot more frequently. Most predators have intestines that are about the length of their body up to 1.5 times the length while grazers generally have intestines that are between 4-6 times their body length.

I would also treat with some sort of anti parasitic med in addition to the antibiotic because more than likely some type of parasite is the cause of the infection.

For any of the brain corals like that I just cut right through the top with a dremel to score it and then Hammer and chisel to detach it from the rest. Acans are practically indestructible.

I have had a few customers report good luck with the lettuce nudibranchs I guess it just depends on if you get a hungry one or not.

I have some brand new ones that have just been sitting around in my garage for awhile that I would sell you for $7 ea. I think I only have about 50 of them out there.

Yes I am the owner of Cichlids and Salt. My wife grew up in Oklahoma. Definately a small world.

I find it funny that this thread is started by someone who opposes wild collection of corals. So basically what you are saying is that you want people to captive raise corals but to not make any money on it. LE and the like corals are a coral farmers way to make money. It is definately a supply and demand market place and there is no one I know out there that would rather put dull bland corals in there tanks as opposed to colorful ones. The reason why these go for so much money is that there are far fewer spectacular corals out there than there is people who want them. Some of these corals are just hype but some are really nice. No one would grow a tortusa if they couldn't get serious money for it because they grow to slow to be farmed for a small amount of money.