Heyya folks. I didn't get a response over in the newbie forum so I thought I'd try here. Has anyone had any luck buying live rock online? Particularely in cold weather...and also, if it says it's already cured, will this reduce my chances of a higher unknown organism count? Thanks for any help.
Buying Live Rock Online
- Thread starter VoodooChild
- Start date
I just did last week
I got it from www.liverocks.com
I love the place...very helpful, GREAT price (88.04 shipped for 20#)
it came with all kinds of critters
some stuff died off, but not that bad, they double heat packed it for me, and overnight shipped it
it came from Florida and I am in North Dakota....5 below the day of shipping and it did fine
I got it from www.liverocks.com
I love the place...very helpful, GREAT price (88.04 shipped for 20#)
it came with all kinds of critters
some stuff died off, but not that bad, they double heat packed it for me, and overnight shipped it
it came from Florida and I am in North Dakota....5 below the day of shipping and it did fine
I recently used liveaquaria.com
Decent amount of life, nothing spectacular. Coralline coverage left a bit to be desired, but for the price I'm not complaining. Give me 6 months, I'll have it lookin' purdy.
If you do a search on this topic, I'm sure you'll find a slew of posts about different companies and members' experiences with them.
Decent amount of life, nothing spectacular. Coralline coverage left a bit to be desired, but for the price I'm not complaining. Give me 6 months, I'll have it lookin' purdy.
If you do a search on this topic, I'm sure you'll find a slew of posts about different companies and members' experiences with them.
Boogiechillin
It's ok, I confuse my students too.
I'm a big fan of www.gulf-view.com - very, very nice aquacultured Caribbean rock. Lots of life on it and fair prices. Never ordered from liverocks.com before, but latazyo's pics looked like it would be worth checking out. I like the fact that both companies aquaculture their rock rather than collecting it - it's a little more environmentally friendly.
Thanks guys. Did any of you have to cure it first? Some places claim that it's pre-cured, totally cured, and uncured. Just curious with what you did.
Pre-cured means it is cured as it sits in their place of business... Expect die off in shipping and to hafta recure it, to some extent anyway...
Uncured will stiiiiiiiiiiiiiink from all the dead stuff you get...
Totally cured = what you get at your LFS and can take from their store to your tank in less than 1-2 hours... Anything more and there will be some die off, perhaps minimum, but there will be some...
No MO LR is gonna come to you 100% cured unless they ship it completely submerged, which no one does that I'm aware of... Of all those mentioned, I've heard the best reports on the Gulf View rock...
Uncured will stiiiiiiiiiiiiiink from all the dead stuff you get...
Totally cured = what you get at your LFS and can take from their store to your tank in less than 1-2 hours... Anything more and there will be some die off, perhaps minimum, but there will be some...
No MO LR is gonna come to you 100% cured unless they ship it completely submerged, which no one does that I'm aware of... Of all those mentioned, I've heard the best reports on the Gulf View rock...
I just ordered a 40lb box of marshals from www.exoticfish.com had it overnighted to Iowa for under 200 bucks. I placed a phone order with them and they said that heat packs were added at no extra charge. I thought cool save me a few more pennies. The next day got my rock and I new something wasn't right. The rock wasn't cured at all and there wasn't a heat pack one to be found. It was about 5 degrees when I got it. Needless to say I wasn't happy. I started out with the shrimp in tank method only to pull the shrimp out and put those nasty smelling things in there. My wife was a little P'od to say the least. The moral to the story is ask around for reputable sellers, you'll be glad you did.
wishmaster,
I'd say your experience was the exception rather than the rule with Jeff's place... I know TONS of people that have bought from Jeff's and most everything has been top notch... Accidents happen, I've learned that...
For example:
I bought a 50lb box of LR from Flying Fish Express... It came and the box was mutilated! The plastic liner was ripped, the was was drying out, it REEKED! My finace, much like youe wife, was NOT happy about this... So I called em, was told "hey, die off occurs during shipping, live with it!" by a very rude person over the phone... Well, I wrote them and complained about this... I just happened to get the same guy via email that I got via telephone... He again tells me the same story and continued his very rude tone... So, being the A-HOLE that I am, replied with a rather blunt letter stating my opinions of that guy, his mother's dating habits and told them I'd make sure everyone on the fish baords know what kind of BS to expect from that company.. So I made good on that threat, posted my very biased review of the company, its employees and its product on this very message board... The guy saw it, and posted my emails, along with my customer contact information, and again stated I was lying, there was no way the rock was as bad off as I claim... Well, I wrote to every email address the company had posted on their web page, finally getting the owner's personal secretary who brought the situation to his attention... He called me, explain that he himself had picked up the load of LR from the airport 2 days prior to this and 3 out of 100 boxes were damaged... He instructed his people to re-pack those boxes before shipping... This did not occur and I got one of those boxes... He made things right, gave me a refund for my purchase and told me to keep the rock, apologized profusely for what had happened and said apropriate action would be taken with the employee.. I asked him not to fire the guy cuz making a family go hungry over some guy's attitude is not something I want to think about at night, so I dunno how that ended...
The point of my rather long winded story, is that accidents do happen and one shouldn't assume that just because one shipment goes wrong that all others will too...
I'd say your experience was the exception rather than the rule with Jeff's place... I know TONS of people that have bought from Jeff's and most everything has been top notch... Accidents happen, I've learned that...
For example:
I bought a 50lb box of LR from Flying Fish Express... It came and the box was mutilated! The plastic liner was ripped, the was was drying out, it REEKED! My finace, much like youe wife, was NOT happy about this... So I called em, was told "hey, die off occurs during shipping, live with it!" by a very rude person over the phone... Well, I wrote them and complained about this... I just happened to get the same guy via email that I got via telephone... He again tells me the same story and continued his very rude tone... So, being the A-HOLE that I am, replied with a rather blunt letter stating my opinions of that guy, his mother's dating habits and told them I'd make sure everyone on the fish baords know what kind of BS to expect from that company.. So I made good on that threat, posted my very biased review of the company, its employees and its product on this very message board... The guy saw it, and posted my emails, along with my customer contact information, and again stated I was lying, there was no way the rock was as bad off as I claim... Well, I wrote to every email address the company had posted on their web page, finally getting the owner's personal secretary who brought the situation to his attention... He called me, explain that he himself had picked up the load of LR from the airport 2 days prior to this and 3 out of 100 boxes were damaged... He instructed his people to re-pack those boxes before shipping... This did not occur and I got one of those boxes... He made things right, gave me a refund for my purchase and told me to keep the rock, apologized profusely for what had happened and said apropriate action would be taken with the employee.. I asked him not to fire the guy cuz making a family go hungry over some guy's attitude is not something I want to think about at night, so I dunno how that ended...
The point of my rather long winded story, is that accidents do happen and one shouldn't assume that just because one shipment goes wrong that all others will too...
RaVenCAD, I actually talked with Jeff himself the day before I placed the order, he said he'd take care of me when I decided to go through with the order. For the price of the LR I had to run with them, I hope this was just one of those things that just happens sometimes. LOL on the story however, remind me not to swerve you in any way.
Thanks alot guys. I think I'll just buy from my lfs. Supports them, and I don't really have the patience to wait a month for the stuff to cure. That's something I should really learn...ah well...I'm setting the tank up tomorrow and I'll put rock in it on
Thursday or Friday.
Thursday or Friday.