Acantasthrea.... are they really worth it?

[gman0526]

Seems like the latest ridiculous fad around the hobby is keeping Acantasthrea Sp. It's not uncommon to find single polyp frags selling for as much as $90~$100.

I've been around the hobby for a while and I remember when Acans. where just as abudant and cheap as any kind of leather or mushrooms. And by the way, almost certainly they would be on the LFS' holding tank b4 anybody would settle to buy one of them for a discount price because nobody seem to pay them that much attention. I'm sure MikeS, Icereefer, Zack, and some of the other members that have been around the hobby for quite some time can remember this. Now they are described as "Extremely Rare", "Collector's Items" way too loosely.

This has happened so often in the hobby is almost a shame. And just this past week after reading Anthony Calfo's editorial on this month's Reefkeeping Mag. I really hadn't given it much thought.

What are your thoughts on this? What other "fads" do you recall that make you think OMG we paid that much for that????

[newtofish]

I am a newbie to this hobby and when I was first researching this hobby things like that are what kept me out for as long as it did. Than I found sites like this one and I dove in.
I am in no position to pay that for a coral, but one never knows. I guess some poeple do.

[Sugar Magnolia]

I've seen some waiting lists on the net for corals that sell for $500 and up per frag. "Extrememly rare". From what I understand with this particular vendor, the parent colony is taken from the wild and allowed to grow out until it's able to support frags and still leave plenty of growth for another year of grow out. The wait list for specific frags is 5-6 years long in some cases. I wish I could remember the website. I came across it last year and was shocked by the prices and the fact that people would wait that long for a frag.

[FishinInTheDark]

I think that was fragfarmer.com, but they no longer do the wait list thing. I'm not sure why, because the lists were long the last time I browsed through. Maybe people were starting to cancel orders. It seems like if you call something rare, we all prop and share the wealth and then it's not so rare anymore!

[MikeS]

Yeah, I remember I used to see lots of different "closed brain" type corals at the LFS's....in all different sizes, shapes, colors, ect....all around $30-50, depending on size, color, ect. But slap the label "Acanthastrea" on it and call it rare...and bam! the price triples...And I bet the vast majority of these corals being sold as Acanthastrea are probably not even true Acanthastrea. I mean they look a heck of a lot like other "closed brain" type corals. Short of being a true expert in coral taxonomy, how would you know? I mean it could just be an off color Trumpet coral, or a Favia brain...who's to say? It amazes me...

Wait a few months or so and these "rare" corals will be everywhere, and then at more realistic prices...I'll borrow an example from the FW side of our hobby (some of you more old timers may remember this... :-D ) Back in the late '80's a few LFS started carrying "rare" albino Tiger Oscars...and at $100-120 a pop! :oops: Well, it didn't take long for these fish to become common and mainstream....and just a few sort years later the LFS's could barely give them away at $7.99 apiece... :lol:

It's funny what happens when you slap a label on something to make it sound more appealing....that article brings that point up very well...( excellent article by the way... http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-02/ac/index.htm )....call it "Ultra Grade" or "Rare" and watch the price shoot up...

Mike

[FishinInTheDark]

Thanks for sharing that article guys. Great read!

[MoonSoft]

Kinda like african cichlids..... except the reason it died.... any idiot with two peacocks can get a brood going!! LMAO!!
soon there were too many and people got bored of looking at them...

[cich1]

good article, parts of it made me laugh out loud

[OceanMaster]

On nano-reef.com its funny...this guy tigahboy has every trendy coral calfo talks about, from pink yumas to tort acros to acanth lords. Someone brought up the calfo article and this guy got freakin pissed. I think he is just mad that he has around ten grand in overpriced corals in his tank which should really be more like a grand. 300 bucks for a quarter sized frag of something with a "synthetic" rarity is just laughable. I feel bad for guys like that who really think that they are making an investment purchasing that stuff. Naive people sure stuff wallets huh?

[MikeS]

that's why I never buy into "rare" corals....trends artificially inflate the market for these items...and the market always corrects itself eventually anyway...

Mike

[OceanMaster]

And I think one of the websites with the wait list is steve tyree's. Theres people waiting on them until 2008. It's kind of pathetic.

[BoldAsBrass]

We are restricting more and more coral areas as "protected waters" in the world. This leads to propagation in hobby tanks, and hence, people can set the market price.

[OceanMaster]

It isn't that the guy has anything that other people don't have. He creates a false sense of urgency with the wait lists and makes people think "oh i better hurry and get MY name on there before it's too late." A lot of the stuff he offers isn't as uncommon as he tries to make them seem..so more power to him for finding a niche and working it hard.

[wwashowi]

I bought an Acans with 80+ polyps for $159.

It was worth it.

Todd

[OceanMaster]

Thats definitely worth it but there are a few different species of acanthastrea with the two most common in the trade being equinatus(sp) and lordhowensis. The equinatus goes for much lower prices than the lordhowensis, and among certain lords there are huge price differences based on coloration and location of collection (ie illegally collected japanese color forms) Just cuz its acans doesnt mean it has to be overpriced, hehe.

[gman0526]

That's reasonable but when you end up payin $70-80 a polyp that's ridiculous.

[mojoreef]

I think the whole thing is ridiculas personally. Bit if folks are willing to pay then I guess thats the way it is. I seen a Acan polyp sell for 800 bucks on ebay awhile ago, just blew my mind.

As per Steve the coral that has the long wait list is what they call the purple monster, It was the first rare coral to be sold, I have to admit it is a rare coral, I have seen alot of corals but none with that coloration. I cant even count the amount of times I have caught Steve in my tank fragging everything in sight, maybe its time for me to ask for a percentage LOL


Mike

[jman785]

OceanMaster,

Do you have some pictures of some of these 'other colorforms' :wink:

[OceanMaster]

I don't personally have any but I've seen many different color patterns of Acanthastrea sp.and from what I've learned the most desirable come from Japan where harvesting of corals is illegal(for export). These include the fiery red and pink colors. I've seen brown and other less attractive colors for sale for much lower prices than the supposedly rare, due to illegal collection, Acanth. I've also heard of red sea Acanth being sold for inflated prices even though it is very common (in contrast to the Japanese specimens).

[wwashowi]

Mine came from Tonga. It is peach in color. It is and it is the echinata (sp) not the lords. But hell it is still awesome.

Todd

ps: hey George, have you visited my store I built in Carolina, PR yet? The Bed Bath & Beyond.

Go spend some money there!! I am building in Ponce this summer.

Todd