I just couldn't resist...

[EvilTwin]

Yep...went to the LFS last night. I always say I want to just go see what they have, pick up some supplies, etc. Inevitably I come home with something. Since I have had my eye on adding a Xenia to my tank, I bought a small frag (actually two) and added it to the tank. The back side of the rock has a second stalk that extends down from the main stalk to the smaller area of the polyps. It made the rock placement a little difficult. Since my daughter was with me, she convinced me (she's 6, and very good at arguing a point) that we needed to get the skunk cleaner shrimp while we were there, too. I was happy to see that they had constructed a new wall of SW tanks in the fish area. One had numerous show piece fiji rock, with corals still attached. They wanted $15 a pound, which is ludicrous to me. Nice looking stuff, tho. Here are the pics:

http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Tracer1989/Aquarium/IMG_2628.jpg

http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Tracer1989/Aquarium/IMG_2629.jpg

[FragOutpost]

Xenia looks good. It looks like it is pulsing pretty good too. You may want to start adding iodide, but beware xenia has the potential to take over a tank, which might be a good thing for you at the moment so you can have something to barter with. Well good luck with it. Keep us updated on your progress. :)

[D12monkey]

Nice find....

[EvilTwin]

Nice find.... Do you think? I honestly don't know. Before I tell you how much I paid, tell me how much you would expect to pay at a LFS. This LFS is about 20 minutes from me and they always have nice coral tanks. One of them is more of a sales tank, which is where the Xenia was. The other is set up more like a display tank but everything in it is for sale. Their prices are a bit higher than another LFS, and definitely more than The Hidden Reef was (they burned down in December).

The Nice LFS: http://finsfeatherspawsclaws.com/

The Hidden Reef: http://thehiddenreef.com/

Check out the link to Hidden Reef and you will see some pics of the destroyed fish room. It really was a tragedy and although I had only been there a few times I really liked the place. The freshwater side of the room had a huge koi pond that my son (he's 3) couldn't stay away from. I think he liked it when the fish kept coming over to him (looking for food, of course). They are apparently running into zoning problems while trying to rebuild/reopen.

On another note, my 45 (supposedly) lbs. of live rock from LiveAquaria.com showed up today. I have to say I was not completely satisfied with what showed up, but then again the only other time I bout LR was when I got started, and that came from The Hidden Reef and was nicely cured already. So, it turns out I got three large pieces of rock, 8 lbs, 12.5 lbs and 19.5 lbs. That is 40 lbs, and left 5 lbs for the box and rubble. Not a lot of rubble, tho. When the Fedex guy was bringing the box to my door it was sagging, so I knew something was wrong. Turns out the bottom of the styro box separated from the sides, so the whole styro box lifted right out of the cardboard, leaving the rock in a plastic bag on top of the styro bottom. Gotta love that. There was one sheet of wet newspaper on top.

The rock didn't have as mich coraline coverage as I woulod have expected. This is supposed to be premium rock, remember. And it was already stinking up the place. I has 15 gals of saltwater ready to go so I used some to clean debris off the rocks and they went into another styro box I had along with water, pumps and a heater to cure. I wish I had an extra skimmer.

One of the rocks had what looked to be a small pink hard coral frag. I doubt it's still alive. Here's some pics. Let me know what you think.

http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Tracer1989/Aquarium/IMG_2633.jpg

http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Tracer1989/Aquarium/IMG_2635.jpg

http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Tracer1989/Aquarium/IMG_2638.jpg

http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e235/Tracer1989/Aquarium/IMG_2640.jpg

[FragOutpost]

The xenia looks very healthy. The going rate for xenia elongotta varies depending on the local market. For example, where I live you can not give that stuff away at local aquarium society meetings because either everybody already has some or everyone is trying to get it out of their tanks. So the market is pretty well flooded with xenia. I suppose a frag like that would go for around $25 or so give or take a few dollars. It all depends on the market. With something like xenia it doesn't much matter though. If you can get it to take root in your tank you will soon have lots of it. All you need is a small piece to start with.

How did the fire start at the hidden reef? I glance over the photos and it looked like a total loss.

Larger pieces of liverock are usually a little more expensive because they are more desirable than a lot of smaller pieces. It doesn't look too bad but I would expect more coraline for premium live rock. If it had any sort of funky smell when you got it the I would cook it for a few weeks before adding it to the tank. That is a poor packaging method that they used to send it to you. You don't really need a skimmer when curing live rock. I would just take all of the rock out of the curing container every few days and dump all of the water out and replace it making sure to blow off the rocks with a powerhead. the important thing is to get all of the debris out that settles on the bottom.

[EvilTwin]

The fire at Hidden Reef supposedly started in the basement of an adjacent store. Supposedly their damage was not from the fire, but from the water used to put it out. It collapsed the main floor into the basement where the fishroom was. Their website above has links to the local news story as well as a video of compiled images from their tanks and store. Nicely done. It's just a shame to think of all the critters that died.

As for my LR, it is now curing in my 60g hex tank. It was the only thing I had that was big enough. It stinks pretty bad and there was a good amount of slime algae and the usual dead critters. Gonna take a few weeks of curing for sure.

[EvilTwin]

After two days of curing the LR, and while doing water tests in my main tank this morning, I decided to test the water in the curing tank, since I never really did this when I set up my 60g.

So, anyway, the PH was 7.8 and the Ammonia was off the chart, at least 8ppm+. Oh, and did it stink! So I went and did a full water change. It really took a while as I am using my 60g hex tank as a curing tank. I've got the rock sitting in 20g of water and there is no drain. I'm actually eager to track the curing progress as I didn't have to do this when I first got started.

[FragOutpost]

Just make sure to get out all of the dead stuff that settles on the bottom and it should help to cure a little faster.