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by **Rob_Reef_Keeper** » November 30th, 2006, 8:38 pm

Stunning

by **IceMan0124** » December 1st, 2006, 10:19 am

truely a work of art, its going to be amazing when it matures

by **Sanjay** » December 8th, 2006, 12:07 pm

Early Christmas present for me and my tank

I was waiting anxiously for the Fedex depot to open so I could go pick up my corals from Live Aquaria. Here they are... even the dog was excited to see them. this time I made sure I had the camera ready.

I ripped into them right away, faster than my kids on Christmas day. The first thing I saw was an acclimatization guide. Very nice touch.

One of my big concerns was that the corals make it here in good shape given that the weather took a nasty turn. We had our first snow and really cold weather with the night time temp dropping to almost 14 F. !!! I was just hoping the corals would not get affected by the cold.

Once I opened the box, I realized my concern were unfounded. The corals were packed extremely well, triple bagged with the thick black plastic in between, and each box had 3 heat packs each that were still warm when I opened the boxes. Not a single drop of water had spilled anywhere !!!! Even the fedex guys commented - no leaky box this time. They had had to deal with me and leaky packages for a very long time.

Could not wait to open the bags. Opened the first one, and checked the temperature in the bag. Now I was very impressed. The temp of the water in the bag was 72 deg F, and the water was absolutely clear.

The size of the frags was nice too... mutliple branches and well encrusted onto the ugly plug. 2 of them fell off the plugs.

Here are some pics of the frags.

Now off to spending the rest of my day putting the 20 frags in. With aquacultured frags like these who needs wild caught stuff !!

My first experience with frags from Live Aquaria and I am very pleased.

Between live aquaria, ORA, and other quality suppliers of aquacultured corals we have come a long way in this hobby.

sanjay.

by **Rob_Reef_Keeper** » December 8th, 2006, 12:19 pm

Very nice. I am thinking about getting some stuff from them.

by **bleedingthought** » December 8th, 2006, 12:47 pm

Looks like a good chunk of money.

Post pictures when they're in place!!

by **Louey** » December 8th, 2006, 5:02 pm

Sanjay, put your camera away and put the frags in the water.

Louey

by **Mike612** » December 8th, 2006, 6:06 pm

How are those three Venustus Angels of yours doing?

by **blackcloudmedia** » December 8th, 2006, 8:11 pm

lol a true reefer. Had to stop everything for a photo shoot whilst the corals scream "Get us in the %(@*ing water!!!!!!"

by **Sanjay** » December 10th, 2006, 11:15 am

Mike612 wrote:How are those three Venustus Angels of yours doing?

Not too good. I lost 1 in the first week. The 2nd one died after about a month of being in the tank. It was eating off the rocks and looked good. Then all of a sudded it stopped eating, seemed like it had a bloated stomach and then died.

I still have one, it is very active in picking off the algae off the rocks, but it does not eat prepared foods yet. Seems to be doing well.

I don't know if its something I did, or its just that these fish do not do well in aquariums.

sanjay.

by **Mike612** » December 10th, 2006, 11:26 am

They don't adapt well to captivity. Mine very rarely ate frozen food either, although I have seen it pick at formula one every so often. You can try that.
One thing I always saw it eat was nori. It took a little while for it to actually learn to pick at it but when it started, it couldn't get enough. Just put some nori on a clip into the tank to get it started. It might surprise you.

by **mr_X** » December 10th, 2006, 1:25 pm

sanjay, how old is your tank now?

by **Matt_** » December 10th, 2006, 2:38 pm

Sanjay wrote:
Mike612 wrote:How are those three Venustus Angels of yours doing?

Not too good. I lost 1 in the first week. The 2nd one died after about a month of being in the tank. It was eating off the rocks and looked good. Then all of a sudded it stopped eating, seemed like it had a bloated stomach and then died.

I still have one, it is very active in picking off the algae off the rocks, but it does not eat prepared foods yet. Seems to be doing well.

I don't know if its something I did, or its just that these fish do not do well in aquariums.

sanjay.

Ditto what Mike said. The closely related P. mutifasciatus was reared in captivity by RCT Hawaii a couple years ago.
http://rcthawaii.com/angel/6.htm
Hopefully they try with P. venustus in the future so more suitable specimens can be available. Beautiful fish.

by **GreshamH** » December 12th, 2006, 2:04 pm

Sanjay wrote:
Mike612 wrote:How are those three Venustus Angels of yours doing?

Not too good. I lost 1 in the first week. The 2nd one died after about a month of being in the tank. It was eating off the rocks and looked good. Then all of a sudded it stopped eating, seemed like it had a bloated stomach and then died.

I still have one, it is very active in picking off the algae off the rocks, but it does not eat prepared foods yet. Seems to be doing well.

I don't know if its something I did, or its just that these fish do not do well in aquariums.

sanjay.

Stomach area turn red as well?

by **Mike612** » December 12th, 2006, 6:01 pm

No I doubt it was that. A lot of Venustus Angels suffer from buoyancy problems because of the way they're collected. If the stomach was bloated, it was most likely that.

by **Sanjay** » December 12th, 2006, 8:44 pm

The first one had problems with its anal area, and I was suspecting that these fish were from deeper waters and that the problem was an infection due to a needle being used to remove air from the swim bladder. But I was not sure if this could be the case not knowing where these fish are collected.

The 2nd one that died surprised me, since it was always moving around the tank eating algae off the rocks and cruising all over the tank. then all of a sudden one day it stayed in hiding and the way it was behaving I knew it was going to be a gone in a few days.

The third one is doing Ok so far.. so I hope it makes it.

sanjay.

by **GreshamH** » December 12th, 2006, 8:57 pm

Mike612 wrote:No I doubt it was that. A lot of Venustus Angels suffer from buoyancy problems because of the way they're collected. If the stomach was bloated, it was most likely that.

You talking to m? That was the path I was going down

I've imported probably 200+ of these, and many had decom problems. A red inflated belly/anal area is a very big sign the divers didn't practice decom. Really a shame, it doesn't require much more effort

by **GreshamH** » December 12th, 2006, 9:01 pm

Sanjay wrote:The first one had problems with its anal area, and I was suspecting that these fish were from deeper waters and that the problem was an infection due to a needle being used to remove air from the swim bladder. But I was not sure if this could be the case not knowing where these fish are collected.

needling isn't the only cause of this (blown swim bladder, mashed up organs, infections from all the above, etc). Many needled fish live in fact, and show zero signs of being needled. The problem arises in needling, when they use other fishes fins to do the needling

Since almost all Venustus theat are imported into this country are from PI, I'd highly suspect all yours came from there.

by **Mike612** » December 12th, 2006, 11:19 pm

Good diagnosis gresamh. I didn't know the angel's stomach turned red also. Mine suffered from a buoyancy problem after 6 months but its stomach wasn't red. Why would it turn red?

by **GreshamH** » December 12th, 2006, 11:34 pm

The red is from hemeraging and or infection. It doesn't always happen, but it's a big sign if you do see it to what happenned to the fish. Tatterred fins are another sign (but also an indictator of other problems).

by **Mike612** » December 13th, 2006, 12:07 am

Hmm interesting. It's good to know.

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