Wild or Aquaculture Red Dragon

[MammothReefer]

wow those are really nice! I haven't seen those morphs before. Not sure I agree with your definition of yellow (looks green to me ) but either way it's an amazing shade of whatever you want to call it.

 

[dvanacker]

Unfortunately, not very rare, mate!…..and there are also blue and green dragons from the same site.

I wouldnt hesitate to say its rarer than strawberry shortcake (seen hundreds get imported over the years), yet it still doesnt take away from the beauty, nor price it seems. Also I guess it depends on your definition of rare and from the impression I get if its available for purchase its not rare. IME there are very few corals that someone cant purchase if they show the means (money).

Why would they only be collected a couple of times??… because the ocean colony is only a frag and is protected?! :lolspin:.

They dont always collect in the same place you know and there are some very far out islands and spots on this planet. I do think that as the hobby grows so does collection and the quality. I have seen it so over the years. The only reason we have maricultured Red Dragon (which really arent that common compared to most typical maricultured pieces) is because the orginal brought the demand and the collectors are now good enough to go on the hunt for them. Some times as in Kiens peices...they are only similar and not the exact same. Also a wild counterpart may be more finicky or not grow as fast.

This is from a reefer in the UK who had one of the first. I think this is when it was a few weeks in. I'm sure he won't mind me posting it. It looks mighty similar to yours and has not had time to grow out yet… sure looks nice to me!.

It sure does look nice. I wont argue that and I never implied other wise?

It's not a rare coral no matter how rare it's made out to be.
For that matter, the ice fire echinata, strawberry shortcake, Monti Setosa amongst many others are now becoming widely available in the UK too. Doubt they came from Reefraft or Tyree either.

You can import all those corals wild, for sure (although at a premium). Now lets see some pictures of your wild or maricultured tyree purple monster, or tyree pink lemonade, or ORA pearlberry. Sure they're are similar corals but in all the shipments I've seen (and I've seen a ton) I have yet to see corals imported exactly the same.

I started this thread about the Red Dragon because I knew they were maricultured versions.

Mine is only a few weeks old, so not worth a pic yet. It stn'd on me the day after I got it and I fragged it down. The other half is mounted quite low, but is now settling well…..

Sorry to hear

So much for LE corals.

What does LE mean anyway. It was started by a one man operation (Tyree). ITs like saying designer....designer what...no body designed corals. But if you are saying LE to show that they are sought after....well ya I guess there are lots of LE corals. I guess I just dont get that statement because you guys are paying a premium for these corals too....

 

[Moser]

Darryl,

The point is that all of these corals are now coming in at standard prices. The same as any other cultured piece. You're right that the LE has created the demand, but a couple of switched on importers and one in particular are bringing them in for near standard prices now.

There is about a $15 premium for red dragon and maybe a few others like Echinata and such, but only because the name has created demand.

The blue and Green Dragon are cheaper, for example....but just as nice as you can see.

Once this importer has confirmed location of particular corals, no coral will be out of reach, or out of price range.

Mo

 

[olee]

HI~~ Guys, may i have a question that whether this is red dragon? thanks

 

[reef bloke]

Hi, I agree with the fact it looks green but then in some lights it looks yellow so its a bit of an in betweener. I haven't see the really green version of this carduus or what could also be turaki.

wow those are really nice! I haven't seen those morphs before. Not sure I agree with your definition of yellow (looks green to me ) but either way it's an amazing shade of whatever you want to call it.

 

[dvanacker]

Darryl,

The point is that all of these corals are now coming in at standard prices. The same as any other cultured piece. You're right that the LE has created the demand, but a couple of switched on importers and one in particular are bringing them in for near standard prices now.

There is about a $15 premium for red dragon and maybe a few others like Echinata and such, but only because the name has created demand.

The blue and Green Dragon are cheaper, for example....but just as nice as you can see.

Once this importer has confirmed location of particular corals, no coral will be out of reach, or out of price range.

Mo

Wow....so let me get this straight. You have access to any piece you want at any time for only a $15 premium. Your LFS is the bomb, cause here in GTA (which many in Canada think is the hub of corals for Canada) we pay over double for something like a strawberry shortcake. Thats on top of the Aussie premium we pay already (which is double that of indo wild, which is double that of a standard indo maricultured). And they are gone instantly. If your LFS is selling them cheaper than perhaps he is not getting much $$ as could (assuming this is the case, sounds like poor business practice to the benefit of hobbyists).

As for a maricultured red dragon. They are so rare in these parts I think there have been only a couple imported in the area and they did go for a way higher premium than $15.

If the premium for sought after corals is so low in your area they must have a real hard time selling a montipora digitata or any other standard mariculture we see in the weekly shipments here.

Have you ever thought that maybe sought after corals are actual sought after for there beauty first....and then someone put a name on it?

I think the only thing we can agree on is that anyone who wants a coral simply for the name is well, less than intelligent.

 

[reef bloke]

I think I paid 15 pounds ( 39 pounds for yellow carduus/turaki) extra for the red dragon but the red dragon was also a much larger coral. This particular vendor is switched on but his pricing is also very fair as he doesn't or hasn't over inflated his pricing to reflect a corals possible ' rarity'

I personally feel there are coral farmers that stick with the older school stuff such as digitata, capricornis, Bali green stag etc as they think it is what we want and it possibly grows quicker and ships better. My vendor/importer asks for stuff such as Hyancinthus , carduus and more interesting colour variants of monti digi etc. By all accounts though he does say that grow out losses for a coral such as Hyancinthus is higher so is more work for the farmer.

This particular importer now has a very good relationship with his farmer and can even choose his shipments based on past mother colonies so he can get in Gomezi for instance that is a little bluer or with more purple by asking for cultured corals from an individual mother coral. It's all quite exciting stuff and not what we are used to in the main.

 

[reef bloke]

I also have run of the mill stuff such as orange digi in my reef, its a very nice coral and I'd still buy it as its far from mundane.

 

[reef bloke]

Just to add that I've also been told that some of the species that we drool after aren't particularly colourful on the reef or at grow out stations. It's only when we get them into our tanks for a few weeks under different nutrient curves and lighting that they start to show other colours.

Red dragon for instance can look tan/pink when at grow out , I thought that fresh imports looked that way due to shipping but I was informed that its quite normal/natural to find them that colour on the reef. Perhaps this is why some corals aren't as popular for farmers as they don't see why we like them.

 

[Scooter902]

Here's the problem with all of this. No real experience with red dragon but a few years back I grew out a good size colony of the original red planet. Ended up selling probably 12 frags of it to different reefers locally. Now if you looked at those 12 different frags that are all grown out there's probably 6 difference color variations based on the systems they are in. A couple called that it didn't color up correctly and that maybe they got the wrong coral. I would direct to the other 6 folks that had great success. Long story short 3 of the 12 decide it wasn't the original and wanted their money back the other 9 loved and sell it as red planet all the time. Even though I pulled all 12 frags from the same colony. It was a real mess and the reason I will never post a named coral again.

My point is there's no way to prove any of this because its more about your parameters then the coral itself.

 

[reef bloke]

This is very true, light,flow and nutrient levels may all change a coral to the point that analysis at microscopic level will be required to I.D it.

So might we say that on a very basic level we buy a coral knowing its requirements and that its well just 'pretty' and after that it is what it is.

 

[Moser]

Wow....so let me get this straight. You have access to any piece you want at any time for only a $15 premium. Your LFS is the bomb, cause here in GTA (which many in Canada think is the hub of corals for Canada) we pay over double for something like a strawberry shortcake. Thats on top of the Aussie premium we pay already (which is double that of indo wild, which is double that of a standard indo maricultured). And they are gone instantly. If your LFS is selling them cheaper than perhaps he is not getting much $$ as could (assuming this is the case, sounds like poor business practice to the benefit of hobbyists).

As for a maricultured red dragon. They are so rare in these parts I think there have been only a couple imported in the area and they did go for a way higher premium than $15.

If the premium for sought after corals is so low in your area they must have a real hard time selling a montipora digitata or any other standard mariculture we see in the weekly shipments here.

Have you ever thought that maybe sought after corals are actual sought after for there beauty first....and then someone put a name on it?

I think the only thing we can agree on is that anyone who wants a coral simply for the name is well, less than intelligent.

I meant about £15 pounds on top of the usual price of about £45.

Over here, the market is not as crazy as the US, but wild Aussie corals still can sell for a lot.

These new corals are only just being imported, but the importer is a very open and honest guy. So, he has built up the trust of nearly every shop and nearly every SPS aquarist in the country.

He could have imported and ripped off (as imo is done in the US). But he now has the majority of SPS business, by selling colonies at reasonable prices. so, to the contrary his business practice is sound and will last. There have been plenty of SPS chop shops and most have come and gone!.

Make no mistake, LE corals are given a name because they are the best. That is why there is a market for LE corals… but, they are not much more rare than any other SPS coral. The desirability means that somewhere along the chain, somebody is making a big mark up on the LE ones and a standard mark up on all of the rest. If LE creates the demand, then it will continue…. The only benefit imo is that you have an idea of what the end product should look like. Over here, we don't often have that, but when corals do colour up, it's nice to see that they actually are the same corals as many LE corals.

Mo