Tampa Bay Saltwater "The Package"

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I'm currently starting a 29 gal. FOWLR tank. I have my filter, skimmer, light, powerheads, heater, and all that. I've been waiting for PremiumAquatics.com to get a shipment of Martial Island Live Rock in. I called the other day, they should be getting it in in probably about a week. Meanwhile, I was looking to get some base rock and sand in the tank. While I was searching online for base rock, I found Tampa Bay Saltwater's website. Has anyone here dealed with them before?

Anyways, they offer what they call "The Package". This is live rock, live sand, misc. cleaners, etc. They sell it by tank size. They first ship you half of the live rock and the live sand which is collected at their live rock farm off the coast of florida and in the gulf of mexico. They recommend you do 25% water changes every time the ammonia gets up to 1ppm for the first 2 weeks while the tank cycles. After cycling, you call them and they send you the other half of the live rock and a cleaning crew consisting of brittle stars, tiger tail cucumbers, blue leg hermits, pepperment shrimp, and turbo snails. They also ship everything in water, not just wet newspaper. Here is a link to the page:
http://www.tampabaysaltwater.com/thepackage/index.html

Can anyone give me an opinion on this?

Also, the only 2 problems I see is they give 1lb./gallon of live sand and I want a 3" sandbed which would probably take more sand. And the 29gal. package comes with 2 tiger tail cucumbers. I understand these are good for the tank but I've also read that if stressed they can puke up their guts and poison and kill everything in the tank. Is this right?
 

Star_Rider

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Dec 21, 2005
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that is the sea cucumbers defense mechanism.
I played with many of the ones here and it takes quite a bit to get them to eviscerate .
I can't respond to how toxic it may be tho.
 

ricsreef

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Jun 22, 2007
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They are a good company,no worries with the cucumbers,they will be fine as long as a rock doesnt fall on them and smash them up.If you talk to them they will send more sand for a little more $.
 

fsn77

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Feb 22, 2006
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There's an old thread on ReefCentral that talks about TampaBaySaltwater... I think it's called "My TBS" or "Our TBS"... lots of info & pix of what people actually received. If you get a chance, you may want to search for it. People tend to give TBS very good reviews. It may seem a bit pricey (mainly because it's an inclusive package and you'd shell out all the money at once), but it would be hard to piece together the rock, sand, and critters for the same price locally.
 

sharkmatt

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Dec 17, 2004
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Sounds good. The only thing I'd say is shouldn't the rock all go in at once otherwise you'll probably get a mini cycle when you add the second half.
 
Also, about the price, the 29 gal. package is only $369.00 however I'm not sure if this includes shipping, I read somewhere on the site that Fed Ex Shipping was $5.50/lb. with a minimum charge of $110.00. This sounds ridiculously high. Premium Aquatics uses UPS which is no where near that price.
 

scubastorey

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Apr 29, 2007
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I purchased "The 55 gal. package" at the end of May and the shipping to Dallas was around $50.00 each time. They use airfreight and you pick it up at the airport. Richard shipped mine at 11:00 am and it was in my tank by 8:00pm the same day. Read the thread on ReefCentral.
 
I have no close airports otherwise I would use that method. I will contact them tomorrow to confirm the shipping. I E-mailed them yesterday about getting extra sand. He said he recommends using 1.25 inches of sand. He said that the critters could not stir 3" of sand and that deep sand beds crash after a few years. Is this true? How much sand do yall use? Nice pic grins.
 
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