Pretty sure it can't happen...but

Hiltonc57

New member
I want to setup a Bahamas style fish tank that only has fish and coral that you would see in atlantic water. I know there are a couple of fish species in the trade. My question is if anyone knew about getting sea rods and brain coral that live in these waters. Id love to keep a venus sea fan, but I know they are hard to keep and can't be harvested.
 
I've never seen brain corals (I think they're illegal to collect in Florida at least), but gorgonians, ricordia, fish and more are readily available.
 
Your best bet for getting corals is to get lucky with getting some on rock from one of the farmed LR suppliers out of FL.
 
There used to be a photosynthetic sea fan going around locally. I had one for a bit bout "the worm" ate it. Love to get it back.
 
IIRC, though harvesting is illegal ,keeping what grows on farmed Carribean live rock is legal. Finding a healthy specimen can be diffcult . The supplier Nate listed(sealifeinc.net)
has one of the more comprehensive listings I've seen.
 
You many end up with a somewhat bare tank. I am sort of in the same boat. Set up the region biotope tank for someone. The real question is how authentic you want to go. I found that you can not get anything from the Bahamas. If you broaden it to a Carib region, you may find limited livestock that is found in all most places. Compare the reef surveys done in the area you are interested in. Aside from the fact that fish are very limited, corals are not being shipped in at all.

Live rock was a pretty big problem. Of all carib places I was able to import live rock frock from the Dominican. The rock came in great looking and loaded with life. Because there was so much life on this rock it cycled hard (extreme conditions) most of the life died. We brought in rock from the FL keys that were actually shipped in water. 200+ lbs in water, the air cargo per weight bill was scary. The rock did come in very nice and had lots of little coral hitchhikers. For the most part there was lots of Oculina and Porites. Tons of sponges and many lived.

Some of the common fish there I was able to obtain from throughout the Caribbean were foureye butterflies, queen angel, atl tang, chalk basses, porkfish, royal grammas, tiger gobies, neon gobies and couple other small fish I am blanking on.

Good luck with the project. It isn't impossible and even depending on the recourses, keep in mind that this tank will still look bare in comparison to a pacific reef aquarium you could put together.
 
My tanks feed the global economy.Well, almost ,I don't have any pure white artic corals anyomore.
 
you should be able to find the seafan Ventilina ventilina as it's fairly common in the trade.

Growing it out is another matter entirely.

The Gorgonian I have spread around upstate is a tropical Atlantic species.
 
If you are planning gorgonians; a piece of the gorgonian Gary has spread around is a plus. I have one ;it's :very hardy ;has nice always extended polyps and a nice cremy yellowish color. Lots of th folks have it so I'm sure you can find a frag when you' re ready.
 
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