Crickets in the Zoanthid Forum

Miz-

Tank maturity effects on zoas! great idea for a thread!!!! Post it up! I am very curious to see what this one brings up!

Hhhhmmmm . . . me also. Don't know though the water flow one hasn't moved much.

I would first off like to welcome mucho to captive reefs. Its been a long time my friend, these forums need people like you. Most of what you say I totally agree with and there are a few things I do not. The price of zoas/palys and any coral for the most part has gotten out of control. Red Hornets for $200 for one polyp, sopranos for $150 a polyp its just ridiculous. But I suppose its all really just a matter of opinion. Although I think those prices are crazy, I have spent $20-$30 on polyps which others might find crazy.

I do question the part ware you say red hornets have been around for a long time and at one point were sitting in stores and owners couldnt give em away. If that is true then why are they only now becoming popular? Ive been in the hobby for about 10 years now and I remember going to stores and the zoas were brown base with either a yellow, red or green center. If you found a zoa with a blue center (basically tubs blue) then the store wouldnt want to sell it or it was very pricey. Im pretty sure if hornets or ppe or darth mauls were out people would have taken notice. I never saw anything like that in stores at least non in south east michigan. Im not saying they didnt exist, but maybe wernt collected like they are now. Collection points have been opening up more in the last decade, more people are diving and I think the demand for quality colorful corals has gone up. To the degree ware polyps should be $100, I dont think so but someone does because someone is paying it.

I dont think anyone on this site should be afraid to post due to getting flammed. This isnt reef central, most of us know each other or have met at swaps and im sure flamming would not fly with the mods on here. If you have a opinion or a question then post it. Just because someone disagrees with you or you disagree with someone doesnt make you a jerk or them a jerk. How you disagree can make you a jerk. If some one did say syrup made there zoas the best they has ever seen, I would hope someone might question it and get a friendly debate going. Then when the thread is over hopefully their is a better understanding, was it the syrup or maybe the person started doing small daily water changes.

You speak of the old days and how things used to be. Currently those days are gone, but with a smaller forum that is growing like captive reefs I think things could change. I remember the days when people would have swaps at there house!! their wernt fantsy set ups and vendors galore. It was a hand full of reefers selling and actually swapping at a swap. A possible idea to get things back to the old days is to have more personal swaps ware someone hosted and only 10-15 people or so came. Or maybe have a swap ware their is no selling, just trading.

In the conversation you state that you will not start threads because you dont want to beg or that you are just a villager. Well every village has a chief and I think when it comes to zoas and palys you are the chief :) You are one of the most respected reefers in the hobby. People automatically are going to follow your lead when it comes to zoas and palys. If you posted that ms. buttersworth syrup made your zoas the best you've ever seen I bet you half the people on this site would go out and buy syrup and start doseing it in their tank. Do you need to beg? no, but I dont think anyone is asking you to beg. You have allot of great ideas and I suppose what people want is the same thing you want, for those ideas to be shared. You cant come on here and say lets get the zoa and paly forum bumping again but not be apart of it. I know you have tried in the past on other sites, I remember those posts. I remember the sunday night give aways ware you would post a question and those who answer correctly would get a free frag. I also remember a few bad apples spoiling it for the rest of us because their answer didnt match yours but were sure their answer was correct. What im saying here is dont let those bad apples spoil it for the rest of us. You came over my apartment when I lived in howel about 5 years ago and gave me several frags for free. I didnt forget mucho, I have been known to give frags away also because I understand the pay it forward mentallity we have. Some of us do remember those things, it does matter to us, and we wont forget.

Mucho I hope you dont take offence to anything I said. You are a generous reefer with allot of ideas, I hope you decide to share them with us. Take care old friend.

Mark

Mark buddy, nice post. I agree with you on many points - I too remember the days of green and brown zoanthids for $30.00 for a nice sized colony. But those days are gone, even the LFS has learned to take the hammer and chizel to those green colonies and bust them up into six or eight pieces for $10 or $20 each. It has become a more expensive game, but the colors that are out there are far and above what they once were. I remember spending $100 to get some Eagle Eye frags from GARF back when the colors were just starting to come in.

Personally, I think that the modern lighting and the color spectrums we are using in our lighting has a big impact on the colors we are seeing today. for example, if you take Joker palys and place them in 10,000K light of high intensity, they will reproduce but turn brown with just a hint of green in the skirts. I think that many of these "rare" polyps have probably been around for awhile, but we're on the cutting edge of figuring out how to get the color to show.

As for the frag swaps, you all gather up your frags and come on over. I'll be happy to host the next frag swap - look forward to meeting you all ;).

Hey what happened to MUCHO? His thread is moving towards the bottom here.

I'm here, just wondering where everyone else is. :stupidme:

Yep, me too :smash:. Its like pulling teeth, to get people to contribute around here. Talking to myself isn't a lot of fun LOL!

Well, I guess it's just us.

Well then, by all means let us continue our discussion. How about a we turn our discussion in the direction of setting up a simple tank specifically dedicated to growing out palys/zoas and how we would go about doing this.

To start, what would be the optimal size of tank? What do you think of the 20L or perhaps a 30breeder? Both are good mid-sized, but smaller tanks that are not too expensive. Personally, I recommend buying only the tank, not lid, no pumps, heaters, etc.

What would be the ideal rock work/structure? Obviously this will have an impact on flow.

Best substrate to include if any? I prefer sand myself, but there are so many options out there anymore.

How would we create ideal flow? Is it cheaper to buy multiple pumps in order to create intersecting flow or is it best to look at a single more expensive pump to provide all the flow?

Best lighting to include? PCs? MH? or T5s?

Keeping in mind that the goal here is to put together an inexpensive system that newbies can afford to get started in the hobby, yet enjoy for a good while.

Perhaps we can share some of Mooch's and Renegades knowledge to the benefit of the hobby. And maybe, just maybe we can get some more interest and sharing of polyps going on. What do you think my friend?

Well I'm jumping on to tag along see what you both think. We have a 36x18x24 with 6x39w hot5 with bout 75 to 80 lbs of rock. Thinking of how to redo it for better everything lol. Seems some zoas and palys do better then others and want to make improvements so they all are happy and getting what they want n need. They can be side by side but some just take off others seem like they grow in slow mo. Don't have a lot of trouble keeping em alive just belive life is a road of learning if we drift off and feel we know everything. We may as well be dead. And to be a real deal reef keeper its our job to evolve as much as we can. Through each persons time and experiances we can take good or bad and learn for the advancement of our personal living reef.
We have aprox 3400 gph flow in tank through 2 powerheads 1 return. Sumps a 20l with a small fuge a reefocto skimmer rated for 150 gallons. A gfo reactor. Use a fiter sock and dose 2 part reef fusion. Run at 79 f and do weekly water changes of 15 to 20 gallons. It is a mixed reef with only a few sps lots more zoas palys and lps. Feed phytofeast ostyerfeast mysis brine krill and flakes oh n algae sheets. Alternate what I feed n do some target feeding.
So keep it going and I can see what I can do better.
Steve