MERKEY

Ya so like I said....lesson learned.

4 minutes ago, Bevo5 said:

Wait - just for closure. Was that not at all the item you bought, or is it just different than the pictures? 

No it was 100% different...i mean it was a torch but not the one I paid for so just different than pictures.  I was offered a refund if I shipped the coral back....im not a vendor and can't guarantee it will arrive back alive....Rudy said if it was dead he wouldn't refund.  After I said I doubted him he said he doubted me.... I won't go into details but I won't be doing buisness with Rudy again and I would advise looking at what you get from him in person before you buy it. 

After our pm's I don’t feel confident dealing with you any further. 

And I'm sure you feel the same.

Lesson learned as a consumer...mods feel free to close. 

37 minutes ago, Blue Z Reef said:

How does it compare to your other torches? Does it look like something else?

 

Honestly, with so many lighting/photography/tank differences, it’s hard to say. Obviously we all want what we pay for but this hobby is a bit unique. Rudy sells amazing corals so I’m surprised it’s much different. This is mainly why I prefer in person buying.

Thanks Blue Z, unfortunately you are right that its more about what I paid for vs. what I got. 

I asked Rudy a lot of questions about lights and filters before so I could get a good idea of what I was buying.  I even offered to make the 4 hour drive to his shop to see it but was declined as its only for pickups on Saturdays between a certain time and not a full time shop.  We have made the drive from whidbey Island for cuttlefish and a couple other members here when we swapped/bought corals.  We are in it for the long haul hahah

You hit the nail on the head about buying in person....I just got mesmerized lol

Thanks Rudy will do...please send me the shipping label like you said you would and I will ship it in the same stuff you shipped it in. 

I dont ship corals so is this going to be my fault if it arrives dead to you? 

2 hours ago, What_The_Frag said:

There appears to be plenty of tissue around the outside rim of the skeleton, acclimate it following Rudy's suggestion and you should be completely fine. Overall, that looks like a very healthy torch!

How are they so different under almost the same lights?  Rudy uses radion blues and I use g4 xr30s on all blues and 0-10%whites.  

Any help would be appreciated 

let me start by saying this torch was recieved a little out of what I'm used to and I was a bit stressed when it arrived....memebers here and Rudy helped me calm a bit and the torch eventually opened. 

Now I need a little help with the lights as these do not look like the same torch....at all.

Rudy says he uses radion blues for his pictures and doesn't saturate or use any filters.  

I use radion xr30 g4s on all blues and 0 to 10% whites. 

I can not see the same torch....

Ya I know I'm that 1 guy that complains when I buy a $300 coral....

I have about 25 euphyllia and 15 other torches in my tank that vary from 24k holy grail to plain green with pink tips and all the dragon soul and hell fires and rainbows as well as aussie golds and aussi sweet tooth and a master torch for fun....im a torch addict!!!

I would just like to find out how to get colors close to what I paid for if im using basically the same lights....yes I know the radion g5 blues are not exactly the xr30 g4 pros but they are close enough to get a proper representation of coral colors. 

I'm sorry if I am upsetting anyone and if anyone thinks I am in the wrong.  Please try to look at it from my position. 

Nice start!

Can't wait to see it full!!!

Thanks for the support guys.

It opened up and is alive which I'm very happy about that. Here it is opened....looks a little different than the pic but I'm sure rudy will help me dial the lights in.

15 minutes ago, Lazyreefer said:

I also agree with this it looks to be within the “safe” area marked with green on the thermometer showing that the temp is about 72F 🤔

Thanks for noticing that, ya noticed that also and calmed a little bit for sure 👍 

Letting it get acclimated for sure.

9 minutes ago, Lazyreefer said:

I have seen a lot of torches look this way in shipment and then get them in the tank and they are fine. As for the water temperature I am sure it is so hard predicting wether to put a heat pack or not in this crazy Oregon weather 62 is definitely very low but it still has a chance, good luck! 

I appreciate the optimistic point of view and I am also leaning that way! 

As we all know things happen and this is by no means an attack on Rudy and I hope it doesn't come off like that... but it just sucks for us all....I hope it does come back...60deg is cold for corals 🥶....my optomistic fingers crossed!

Rudy is a great guy and this is part of the hobby.

this torch came from golden basket and Im trting to get a hold of them but my messages seem to only send 3 pics at a time so I'm hoping to add to them here. 

Torch came in this morning and was  shipped with no heat pack and temped at 62deg.

It looks like its dead or dying and I'm keeping my fingers crossed it can make it.  I can only load 3 pics

Welcome to the group!

Can't wait to see a pic of your tank when its full!

12 minutes ago, Matteo said:

Thanks for all the inside info! Lot of conflicting stuff on the forums so nice to hear a local anecdote. Luckily you locals may keep my full of asternias! 

We are still super new to them as well so this really is a learning curve! When ever we make our next trip to Portland I'll fill a bag of asternias up for you!!

1 hour ago, Matteo said:

sweeet. so is 1 star a month sufficient? 

Technically yes....but you need to watch them and see how fast they feed on it.  You could have a couple little fatties and go through 2 or 3 a month.  

Is it over feeding...probably but all the research i find says to feed them if they will eat...so i just keep dropping them in lol

On a side note ours do eat frozen as during the start of the pandemic stars were hard to get and we had to freeze a couple.  We crossed our fingers and to our surprise they ate them....so we just keep 1 cut up in the freezer just in case.

1 hour ago, Matteo said:

So If I throw a chocolate chip star in we are thinking one a month for the pair? will the star harm my tank? I don't have another tank to keep it at the moment 

They don't let the star go once they find it.  Mine usually find the staf witjing a few hours.   I will say I have caught 1 star eating newly formed gsp before the shrimp found it but I didnt mind that hahaha

2 hours ago, Matteo said:

Okay couple questions!

 

So the female will tripple in size? I noticed she is out more on the hunt than the male is. How do you feed your shrimp the choco stars? Do you cut a leg or bits off? I was gonna go the frozen route and buy one and cute them all into little pieces and feed occasionally plus donations from you homies!

I have the gear to setup a culture tank, would it be easy to breed the crap out of these asternia starts in a 10g?

 

Now about breeding, what do you do with the larve? how do you catch them and put in another tank? Will they only eat live pods and such as babies? once the babies hatch do they need the parents or can they be in their own tank?

 

Any other ez pz star fish besides chocochip? It is only a 40 nuvo so if I threw a whole star in Idk about that...

 

thanks! 

We stafted by cutting legs off and feeding 1 leg to each shrimp.  They would finish the legs in about 2 days and come to the front of the tank like they wanted more or like they were hunting.  We did a little more research and found that most harlys will keep the star alive until its gone.

We started adding whole chocolates and without doubt the pair would eat the legs first and then the mouth.  This takes about 1 week and a few days.  If the female is in egg mode she feeds more. 

Our female tripled but we did get her small.  She is easily now 2X the males size and most likely done growing around the 2" she is. 

As for asterina stars I would imagine they would reproduce in any established tank with algea growth....so for sure in a 10!

There is a device sold on the web for around 80 bucks.  Its called the volcano or something.  It basically surrounds the female when she lays releases her eggs and the eggs naturally swim up to the collection are.   The babies start on rotifers and phyto them move to asterina stars.  They are so small when they start eating stars that around 10-20 can eat on the same asterina star lol

Ours are in a 32 biocube with a pair of manderins so the babies get eaten very quickly hahah

Ours also eat sand sifting stars...I just drop the stars in a separate area and let the hunt begin hahah

Oh she's still close to his size....Its so fun to watch her triple him in size!

We are looking into culturing rotifers for the babies and also trying to make one of the nifty baby catchers....our manderins LOVE the babies when the female releases the eggs. 

Nice looking pair!

How much do we need to spend for free shipping?

Hey Matteo,

We have a pair also...once the female gets comfortable she will start to hold eggs every 20 days or so....Im sure you already know this hahah

But my point is our famle will start to take down 1 small chocolate start every week and a half until she releases her eggs....so around 3  starts a month.

We might be feeding too much but they are happy and produce about every 20 days for us. 

The male is so hilarious and cute.  He will protect the female and also get her food if the star gets away hahah

If we lived closer I'd give you some asterina stars as we started cultivating them in our big tank to feed the little tank that hold the harliquin pair. 

Post pics of the couple!!

Man if I lived closer!

Happy bday!

Looking good!

Can't wait to ses it full of livestock!

I just wanted to say what a great transaction and encounter it was with Matteo.

He was a very nice guy and his tank was AMAZING!

THANKS MATTEO 

The torch is nice and happy!!

55 minutes ago, TaylorW said:

Nice! Did you get that torch from Matteo?

Sent from my moto g(7) using Tapatalk
 

No thats from cuttlefish...

This is matteos...and a 24k HG Ipicked up yesterday as well...it was an amazing torch day!