Bonus/Ultra LPS and Softies List for Member Swap

[Chromis]

There seems to be a “fake” goldmeister which is brownish with green-yellow stripes and a JF Goldmeister which is a lovely rose color with yellow-green stripes. Maybe the source of confusion is hobbyists peddling brownmeisters as Goldmeisters. Neptune sells something like Goldmeister for ~$100 and I would like to see it on bonus list.

 

[Bruce Spiegelman]

Here's the thing -- and there was some truth to RandyC's comment -- I do spend an inordinate amount of time looking at corals. I probably get a coral order in on average once a week. And I rarely buy corals from an LFS these days so my perception may be skewed The Goldmeister (to me) was on the bubble, but I've recently seen it being sold at $25.00 a frag so my thought was it just didn't quite fit a bonus. However, just because of my weird coral habits and inordinate amount of time online, I shouldn't be the final arbitrator. We should probably have a panel vote on it.

However, the real issue is that it's easy to get people commenting on things, but it's much harder to get them involved. Three of us stepped up to re-do this list for this swap. Perhaps others would like to volunteer for the next swap to revise?

 

[Bruce Spiegelman]

Or we just crowd source as we're doing now. There seems to be enough folks that want a Goldmeister on the list so it should probably be added.

 

[sfsuphysics]

Well I'm going to toss in my own controversy into this, and this goes beyond what's bonus/ultra/rare/whatever.

Unfortunately this is the problem with Jason Fox (or any one who's banking their name on them) corals, if they don't look like what he's selling then IMO they are not as desirable. Now at a swap or store I don't give a flying flip about "lineage" if there's going to be a name associated with it, then it should look how the coral was marketed. Brown acro nub that someone say is Eddie's Purple Monster? "Where's the purple?" Sunset monti that's brown with green polyps, "where's the orange base?" Walt Disney Acro that has some green and yellowish brown to it? I don't care if it's direct from Snow White's castle is Anaheim that's not what I'm getting. And unfortunately that picture of "Goldmeister" doesn't look anything like a "Goldmeister" pictures I just Googled, now I'm not saying it's an "imitation" just saying it's not what's advertised.. "Where's the gold?", maybe it's a photo that doesn't represent what it looks like, maybe it lost coloration, but at the end of the day if someone picks up a "Goldmeister" frag and they get browish with greenspots chalice they might call shenanigans on the member who put that in, doubly so if said member gets a bonus pick out of it.

Just my 2 cents. But I'm old school, we called corals based on the name of the coral or some color that represents what that name is, Green Slimer, Becker Tort, Gorilla Nipple Zoas!!!!!


FYI, at the end of the last swap if memory serves there was some decent feedback on what should/shouldn't be included in the bonus list, some of which was based on observation. Which I think is a great time to do it while it's fresh in everyone's minds. Now I'm not sure if anyone wrote those suggestions down or made changes on the spot but the theory of what was done was good

 

[Bruce Spiegelman]

Right -- but that would be making a case for not having Bonus rounds at all which is a reasonable position especially for a members only swap. Unfortunately. if there aren't bonus rounds then less people bring out their better corals and many club members never get a chance to get one then. If we're going to have bonus rounds then lineaged corals matter because they are a huge part of the high-end coral business.

 

[RandyC]

There seems to be a “fake” goldmeister which is brownish with green-yellow stripes and a JF Goldmeister which is a lovely rose color with yellow-green stripes. Maybe the source of confusion is hobbyists peddling brownmeisters as Goldmeisters. Neptune sells something like Goldmeister for ~$100 and I would like to see it on bonus list.

You'll be happy then @Chromis, my original frag came from Neptune.

 

[sfsuphysics]

Right -- but that would be making a case for not having Bonus rounds at all which is a reasonable position especially for a members only swap. Unfortunately. if there aren't bonus rounds then less people bring out their better corals and many club members never get a chance to get one then. If we're going to have bonus rounds then lineaged corals matter because they are a huge part of the high-end coral business.

Nah, not a case for removing bonus rounds, just give what's represented. Would you allow an unhealthy coral regardless of lineage? Then why let in a lineage piece that doesn't look the same color as what made it desirable? At the end of the day isn't that what the bonus round is there for? To get desirable corals?

I mean I get there's an unspoken warning sign on all of Jason Fox's corals "This farmer grows under ONLY blue LEDs, if you want it to look the same you better match those same conditions" but for crying out loud if you're getting a lineage piece I would at least hope it looks like the lineage piece.

Then there gets to the point of how do you even determine whether it's a lineage piece? Because someone says it is? Some store throws a sign on a coral vat that says it is? How do you know somewhere in the history of someone's frag there wasn't someone who maybe fibbed over where the coral was from and through the whole chain of fragging swapping hands that myth was perpetuated that it is THAT lineage piece. So for me you want to claim some lineage, then fine, but as a bit of "evidence" maybe it should in fact look like said lineage piece. I've been in the hobby long enough and have seen enough unboxing from wholesalers to know that stores have in the past gone with the "oh this looks like THAT coral that sells for $100/frag so lets just call it that coral" or "put these two clownfish in that tank and we can say they are a bonded pair and sell them for more".

 

[Bruce Spiegelman]

Anyone else with requests for additions or subtractions from the current list?

 

[sfsuphysics]

I'd remove the rainbow bubble tip anemone, and simply put a placeholder for bubble tips that requires some preregistration verification that it looks good, i.e. black widow, colorado sunburst, lemon drop (not that I think ANYONE would put the last two in). I think there's not enough difference between a "standard rose" and a "rainbow"

 

[Kremis]

I'd remove the rainbow bubble tip anemone, and simply put a placeholder for bubble tips that requires some preregistration verification that it looks good, i.e. black widow, colorado sunburst, lemon drop (not that I think ANYONE would put the last two in). I think there's not enough difference between a "standard rose" and a "rainbow"

i think black widows, csb etc are ultra, and rainbow bubble tips should stay as bonus. there is definitely a difference between a nice rainbow and a standard rose.

I also think for the soft corals we should add the "japaneese deepwater toadstool" as a bonus (full green toadstool - not just the polyps)

 

[sfsuphysics]

i think black widows, csb etc are ultra, and rainbow bubble tips should stay as bonus. there is definitely a difference between a nice rainbow and a standard rose.

Not disagreeing with difference between nice rainbow and standard rose, but there in lies the rub, it's not a "nice rainbow" that is a bonus item it's a "rainbow" and I've seen the stuff people have been calling Rainbow BTAs for a while and the vast majority of them are nothing special. Which is why I suggested "pre-registration" of bonus corals, which IMO I think would be a good idea as it is, granted I can imagine the issues with that if you're not good with a camera and you take windex blue photos because of your lights, but it is an idea

 

[ashburn2k]

Sadly you're right.

@RandyC is no better, he has 4 tanks and 3 babies to stare at.

 

[RandyC]

@RandyC is no better, he has 4 tanks and 3 babies to stare at.

Only TWO have water in it! The other two don't count!

 

[sfsuphysics]

Are the babies full of water?

 

[JVU]

Revising the bonus/ultra lists is definitely one of those things in life where it’s a lot harder to be the one doing it than it is to be a critic.

I don’t always agree with the changes, for example several of my corals I think are bonus-worthy and had already fragged that were on last swap’s bonus list, were taken off the current bonus list. Of course I’ll still bring them, but now with no bonus love. No sweat.

Plus it is super-subjective, which means the only guarantee is that we won’t all agree on the details, even if we agree on the criteria.

Nevertheless, incentivizing having larger numbers of great corals in the system is good for everyone and revising the list is necessary to achieve this, so I’m very thankful that we have a few committed members willing to step up and do this for all us. Thank you.

 

[Vhuang168]

Not disagreeing with difference between nice rainbow and standard rose, but there in lies the rub, it's not a "nice rainbow" that is a bonus item it's a "rainbow" and I've seen the stuff people have been calling Rainbow BTAs for a while and the vast majority of them are nothing special. Which is why I suggested "pre-registration" of bonus corals, which IMO I think would be a good idea as it is, granted I can imagine the issues with that if you're not good with a camera and you take windex blue photos because of your lights, but it is an idea

Are you volunteering to take this on?

 

[sfsuphysics]

Are you volunteering to take this on?

Sure, if people were to post pictures of their bonus corals I would be happy to verify that it's a good specimen that said Rainbow looks like a good Rainbow or whatever other coral that may be questionable out there.

 

[Bruce Spiegelman]

We didn't get into the rarer Nems simply because it's a very small niche in the hobby. It's one of those things we figured that if people were considering bring them they would ask -- just like the do with certain corals. If they don't then Vincent and the others can make that determination at the entrance table.

 

[Coral reefer]

So, for the experts, or anyone with an opinion...is this a regular or a bonus?

 

[sfsuphysics]

Well if I was giving the bonus thumbs up or down, I would give a thumbs down. Doesn't look terribly different from a rose, probably is just a rose, I really question peoples definition of rainbow sometime so yeah... The green speckles on the bubbles do look interesting, but not that interesting to change my mind... not that I have an opinion on the bonus matter or not


But they can be very difficult to picture "well" under white lights unless you are a master with the camera. Most of the nicer ones I see tend to be "balanced" with some post processing software (photoshop)