Showing my new wild sps

Aren't there some great reefs in japan? Or is collection banned?

Wild acros did bother me. Until I saw the shear numbers of them on a reef and that the weather alone destroys beyond more you could imagine. Picture 2 meter or more colony's of table acros literally ripped from the reef and destroyed in storms. Crown of thorns eating them, water like a bath cooking them.....

Although maricultured coral is certainly a very good idea and is clearly more sustainable as nothing (allegedly) is taken from the reef.

What I will say though is that on a reef of thousands of acros the real nice coloured stuff is pretty rare, for every fifty cream brown with blue tip acros there's a purple. However the colour of the sun does make everything look brown so all those brown ones probably don't look brown when in a tank somewhere.

You are right, some lfs will import corals from Japan , but it's very expensive and importing from Japan is not easy. They need to do way more work to get the license from Japan. Once in a while we will get some sps from Fiji too.
 
Yes I wish they import maricultured pieces more often. When they have it will all be sold in just 1 day. I'm always too late for it :(

I wouldn't sweat it too much, some mariculture facilities aren't destroying the reef much less than wild collection, plus they are full of pests. They're so bad that I will never buy another mariculture piece again; too risky for my full grown tank even with dipping and QT.
 
I wouldn't sweat it too much, some mariculture facilities aren't destroying the reef much less than wild collection, plus they are full of pests. They're so bad that I will never buy another mariculture piece again; too risky for my full grown tank even with dipping and QT.

I think I agree

It's almost clear a lot of Maris are just snapped off branches, very very few are properly based out.

The pests are a real problem. I'm yet to see any pests on oz wild acros.
 
Ouch, Peter! Do you know this firsthand, or are you guessing because colonies aren't encrusted enough to your liking? Since every branching sps frag is a snapped off branch, lol...
 
I wouldn't sweat it too much, some mariculture facilities aren't destroying the reef much less than wild collection, plus they are full of pests. They're so bad that I will never buy another mariculture piece again; too risky for my full grown tank even with dipping and QT.

When was the last time you bought a maricultured acro? I have not noticed them to be full of pests more recently. But every batch and supplier are different. If your using a proper qt I don't see how it could be risky.

I have seen more aefw and red bugs by buying corals from club members and visiting club members homes than I have on any wild or maricultured corals hands down. In fact I just had an experience where I ordered a frag pack from a member on another big site that had a huge list of acros and he sent me multiple frags that were covered in bite marks... There is no telling how many people got frags like that and just didn't know what was wrong. A lot of people ordered from him. On the other hand in have not bought a maricultured colony that had bite marks or eggs (at least visible on the coral) in 3 or 4 years. I do only buy them when they first arrive or when they have been sitting for over a month after people have bought a lot. Once they have sat for a while its pretty easy to see if the batch had flatworms in it. But on the whole I have noticed them coming in looking very clean and healthy compared to years back.
 
I wouldn't sweat it too much, some mariculture facilities aren't destroying the reef much less than wild collection, plus they are full of pests. They're so bad that I will never buy another mariculture piece again; too risky for my full grown tank even with dipping and QT.

So far haven't got any pest from wild or maricultured pieces. I always inspect them very carefully and the maricultured pieces are very clean.
 
Very nice
Just curious how much are the corals in Hong Kong?

Prices are different , it's hard to tell. I have seen rare sps going for hundreds dollars . But the most common sps from Indonesia are around $50 dollar for wild colony. Australian sps are twice the price of Indonesia sps. Ora and reef raft sps are very expensive here.
 
When was the last time you bought a maricultured acro? I have not noticed them to be full of pests more recently. But every batch and supplier are different. If your using a proper qt I don't see how it could be risky.

I have seen more aefw and red bugs by buying corals from club members and visiting club members homes than I have on any wild or maricultured corals hands down. In fact I just had an experience where I ordered a frag pack from a member on another big site that had a huge list of acros and he sent me multiple frags that were covered in bite marks... There is no telling how many people got frags like that and just didn't know what was wrong. A lot of people ordered from him. On the other hand in have not bought a maricultured colony that had bite marks or eggs (at least visible on the coral) in 3 or 4 years. I do only buy them when they first arrive or when they have been sitting for over a month after people have bought a lot. Once they have sat for a while its pretty easy to see if the batch had flatworms in it. But on the whole I have noticed them coming in looking very clean and healthy compared to years back.


It probably been 2 years since I've bought one. I have seen them at the LFS with pests even when they go through Bayer dips and it appeared the AEFW were not just coming from the system. It's good if they have gotten better, but I've just had too many strange issues with them. I've thrown away probably 4 or 5 colonies over the years rather than dip, quarantine and hope I got everything. I've never had a wild colony come in with a pest... As for pests from hobbyist... I'm very careful on who I deal with, and dip and quarantine.
 
It probably been 2 years since I've bought one. I have seen them at the LFS with pests even when they go through Bayer dips and it appeared the AEFW were not just coming from the system. It's good if they have gotten better, but I've just had too many strange issues with them. I've thrown away probably 4 or 5 colonies over the years rather than dip, quarantine and hope I got everything. I've never had a wild colony come in with a pest... As for pests from hobbyist... I'm very careful on who I deal with, and dip and quarantine.

Any LFS that is not willing to put in the work involved in keeping maricultured acros clean when they are for sale I don't go to, which is most in my area. Because like you said the bad one in the bunch just infects others and if not taken care of your screwed.
 
Any LFS that is not willing to put in the work involved in keeping maricultured acros clean when they are for sale I don't go to, which is most in my area. Because like you said the bad one in the bunch just infects others and if not taken care of your screwed.

I pointed out to an LFS manager a few AEFW bites on some maricultured pieces that were fragged up...he was like...yeah ok. And walked off. :mad2:

Weeks later I told one of the guys who looks after the SPS coral section...he seemed concerned and ask me to go in and dip some corals and show him the AEFW's. I went the same day and sure enough when I dipped the corals in CoralRX AEFW's flew off.

I spoke to the owner of coral nursery and he recently started to import and sell Mari stuff to LFS's in my area and he confirmed that Maricultured SPS from some locations come infested with AEFW.

IMO the main reason the mari stuff tends to have lots of AEFW is because in some locations where these corals are grown, the natural predator for AEFW's is not present.
 
I pointed out to an LFS manager a few AEFW bites on some maricultured pieces that were fragged up...he was like...yeah ok. And walked off. :mad2:

Weeks later I told one of the guys who looks after the SPS coral section...he seemed concerned and ask me to go in and dip some corals and show him the AEFW's. I went the same day and sure enough when I dipped the corals in CoralRX AEFW's flew off.

I spoke to the owner of coral nursery and he recently started to import and sell Mari stuff to LFS's in my area and he confirmed that Maricultured SPS from some locations come infested with AEFW.

IMO the main reason the mari stuff tends to have lots of AEFW is because in some locations where these corals are grown, the natural predator for AEFW's is not present.

Yeah, if you see the way they're farmed, it makes perfect sense why AEFW are more common with them. I don't think it's a coincidence that AEFW and red bugs became far more prevalent in the hobby with the rise in popularity of maricultured Acropora.
 
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