Reef nutrition

Time to Update the Bonus and Ultra Zoa/Soft Coral - What qualifies?

Wlachnit

Wlachnit

Past President
BARcard
Let's update this lifs while fresh from the last swap. I would like to hear from people whether some of these should be taken off the list because they are no longer scarce within the club. Mike mentioned that Rastas were abundant at the swap. Others?

Also, should we retain the 1 polyp rule? Or change the number of polyps?

BONUS CORALS
Zoas/Palys
5 polyps - Chong Bongs
5 polyps - Purple People Eaters
5 polyps - Vivid Rainbow Zoas
5 polyps - Rasta
5 polyps - Emeralds on Fire
5 polyps - Armageddons
5 polyps - Magicians

4 polyps - Flaming Zebras
4 polyps - Yellow Brick Road
4 polyps - Blue Hornets

3 polyps - Blondies (BBEB)
3 polyps - CRC Candy Apple Blues
3 polyps - Gatorades
3 polyps - Fruit Loops
3 polyps - Goblins Fire
3 polyps - Gold Mauls
3 polyps - Maryjanes
3 polyps - My Clementines
3 polyps - Pink Hallucinations
3 polyps - Prometheans
3 polyps - WWC Laser Lemons
3 polyps - YR Peachy Blues

2 polyps - CRC Blue Angels
2 polyps - Alien Acne
2 polyps - Blue Lagoon
2 polyps - Candy Apple Reds
2 polyps - KH Sunburst
2 polyps - KO Nightmares
2 polyps - LC Petroglyphs
2 polyps - Paradise
2 polyps - Pink Hippos
2 polyps - RR Banana Boat
2 polyps - Seduction People Eater
2 polyps - Tyree Orange Rainbows
2 polyps - Tyree Space Monsters
2 polyps - Utter Chaos
2 polyps - WOWs
2 polyps - Yodas

1 polyp - ASD Rainbow Ring Pharaoh
1 polyp - Butt Munchers
1 polyp - Darth Maul
1 polyp - Oompa Loompas
1 polyp - Rainbow Kazoo/Latin Lovers
1 polyp - Rainbow Rhinos
1 polyp - WWC Pink Krakatoa
1 polyp - White Velvets
1 polyp - RR pink diamonds


Soft Corals
2 Colors or More 1-1/2" min – Ricordea Yuma
Pink Ricordea Florida
2 Colors or More – Rock flower Anemone
Rainbow Bubble Tipped Anemone
Red St. Thomas Mushroom

Ultra Corals

Zoas/Palys
1 polyp - Adonis
1 polyp - ASD Leprechauns
1 polyp - Wowser/Bowser/Hyper Candy/CandyAppleOrange
1 polyp - Flaming Mohican
1 polyp - GB Emperor
1 polyp - Hallucination
1 polyp - JF Askrak
1 polyp - JF Acid Reflux
1 polyp - JF Bloodshot
1 polyp - Speckled Krakatoa
1 polyp - Rainbow Maul
1 polyp - Ultimate Chaos
3 polyps - RR pink diamonds

Soft Corals
Dolphin Pet Village Bubbled Tipped Anemone
Dime Size - Gonzo Golden Dragon Mushroom
Nickel Size - Forest Fire Rhodactis aka Sexy Corals Superfreak Mushroom
Highlighter Pink Ricordea Yuma
Baby Jawbreaker/Tye Dye Mushroom
Bounce Mushroom
Eclectus Mushroom
Interstellar Mushroom
Kryptonite Mushroom
 
Well as much as I would love to add input to this, I don't know much about what is "hot" out there ... granted mostly because I have a very cranky view on corals that are all named and crap... but mostly because I really don't know what's desirable (aka hot) out there. As such I would definitely differ to experience in this matter with people like Eric and Vincent.

That said, are we talking stuff we want to see at swaps? versus actually rare? I only ask this because I see a ricorda yuma, with 2 or more colors and I don't think I've seen one with less than 2 colors, that said I've never seen one at a swap with the 1.5" size requirement.
 
Tell me if this is not the right place to post this, but where do all the new coral names come from? And the snazzy popping colors? They all came from the ocean, and I think used to be called like Bali green slimer or oh-so-rare Christmas Island whatever. Then Steve Tyree started selling blue acro frags out of his trunk in Lodi, then his name attached for some reason. To know which blue coral it was?
So do high end coral frag sellers buy up a lot of new stock from wholesalers, put it in good light and wait and see what colors up? I think wholesalers do not do this. Or maybe some of their employees do.
If you get lucky and no one else is selling your color morph, it gets your company name and it sticks even if other companies propagate it?
If someone places corals near each other and zooxanthellae transfer over and colors change which I hear happens, is that renamed?
Then I guess there's grafting, which is a whole other thing.
Is there an agreed upon online database of everything or do you just have to surf around and keep up with the photography on sellers' websites?
Like Mike, I am not into the hype. I can see why it can be fun to chase trendy specimens and also how names can make it easier to differentiate between color variations, but I'm not sure what a seller did to earn naming rights to a coral. Are reefers in Germany using the same zoa names on our list?
 
So a little history and to answer some questions, as to how I saw how things came about in regards to naming conventions and coloration.

One of the first, if not the first, designer coral was actually the Tyree PM (purple monster). It was a piece that came from the Solomon Islands that was imported into the country and survived in the dark ages of sps keeping ('90s). Back then it was really hard to keep sps alive, let alone with any colors, even though you could buy fist size and larger colonies for dollars or tens of dollars for "colored" sps on the wholesale/transhipped lists. The PM was eventually fragged and sold at a staggering $50, which doesn't seem much by today's standard considering that the PM is still so high in demand, but back then it was still expensive considering that you could buy a bottlebrush colony for ~$5-10. Steve for the most part didn't own a lot of the corals that you saw on fragfarmers, but collected them from other aquarists, and farmed them out. He eventually named them and charged a premium for them due to the fact that they survived in captivity and held their colors. That eventually lead to other sources also naming their corals, from hobbyists (Tubbs, Karl, etc.) to reef shops (Atlantis, Aquascene, etc.). Fast forward to today and you have a plethora of named pieces from different stores, vendors, and hobbyists.

In regards to new stock, a lot of it does come from wholesalers who distributes it to other resellers, who sits on the wild colonies until they color up. Corals do shift their colors from the ocean to our tanks. Sometime, a single larger colony is split up and distributed to multiple sources and this is why some of the pieces are all related. They then have to keep the piece alive and begin the process of coloring them up, which can take 6+ months. This would seem easy, but it isn't considering what you're looking at. Rainbow blastos are notoriously for shipping poorly and then melting/receding over time, which can be expensive (some of them go for $250-400/polyp). Also, why there are very few brown corals collected and they will eventually color up (if you can keep them alive), not all of them will be gems. In the case of some of these high end resellers, they go through something astounding like 500+ pieces or so before they encounter something that they can stick a sizable price tag on.

As for reefers in other areas of the world, to a large degree, there isn't such a variety, which is mostly due to the limited selection available to them. In one of the MACNA sessions, where they discussed the distribution of the marine trade, there was a distribution chart. Amazingly, the US occupies 50% of the pie, and then 10% were distributed to some of the other key areas in the world - Europe, Asia/HK/JP, and then everywhere else. It might, however be biased, since the study and collection of the data was limited in scope. You can however read about this in other larger forums where folks in the UK and Australia have very limited pickings. You would expect that Australia being so close to Indo/Fiji/Bali would have some of the best pickings out there, but the demand/money isn't there and so they get exported to the other parts of the world.

In regards to the transfer of zooxanthellae, those are usually renamed to morphed versions, such as morphed mummy eye. Same applies to grafted pieces such as grafted setosas and caps.
 
Why are pink diamonds on both lists? I thought the rule I saw was no matter how big or how many polyps, they were only bonus or ultra. I vote bonus list.... Don’t see the SPS list. No updates to that one?
 
I would add the following zoas to bonus:
rainbow incinerator (1-2 polyp)
wwc twizzler (3-4 polyp)
rainbow hornet (2 polyp)
asd hyper jubilee (1 polyp)
wwc halle berry (3-4 polyp_
wwc aoi (2 polyp)
wwc purple monster (1 polyp)
red hornet (4 polyp) - why is there blue but not red ?


for ultra, a new one that some people have is the buttkisser zoa

im pretty much basing these off of value, not sure what people are looking for in the club
 
Maybe while we work on this list we should pin it and keep working on it as an on going project. The general rule of thumb is that bonus level is based on a value. One of the things we may need to think about is setting a value for each level. Also if we work on the list in an ongoing process it will be a better idea of what is in the club.
 
The reason why there's a bonus and ultra section is due to how the swap works. 1 polyp of something is in the bonus category, but a larger frag, e.g. 3 polyps, is in the ultra category instead. The ultras gets to pick through the first round before the first round (everyone from group A). 3 bonus = 1 ultra. It was a way to be more inclusive so that we would have more people qualify for the ultra round.

Many of the frags should be cut at least a week beforehand just to ensure that they heal properly and survive to make it into someone's tank. In the case of zoas, you can cut a large 3 polyp frag or you can cut a 1 polyp frag weeks or months in advance and by the time that the swap rolls around, you might have that 1 polyp still or have multiple polyps. Your 3 polyp would qualify as an ultra, but if that 1 polyp that you cut didn't grow, it could then be combined with other bonus corals to add up to the 3 bonuses needed for an ultra ticket. They're on both list just in the event that either scenario occurs.

The lists are usually worked on relatively close to the event due to the fact that supply and demand, as well as value, changes over time. The swaps happen ~6 months from each other and while there is value in starting to work on this list currently, just be aware that they will and can change by the time that the members swap occurs.
 
I agree that having some of the same corals on both the bonus and ultra lists is not very useful, and can be confusing as we saw at the swap.

That said, I’d be fine with people getting credit for 2 bonus tickets for a bonus frag that grew to twice (or more) the polyp count or size required.

I’m also wondering if there is a place for giving bonus credit for corals that normally would not count as bonus, but that are given in much larger size/quantity? Like colony size. I would think this would have been discussed before. It would be a real-time judgement call since you can’t list every possibility.

Also I suggest renaming the bonus round to “first round”, with “first round tickets”. This would be a more familiar naming for new members, since it is already used broadly, for example in draft picking. Lots of people are confused by the overlapping terms bonus round, bonus tickets, bonus corals, ultra corals. We could keep the names and rules of 3 bonus corals giving you 1 first round ticket, and 1 ultra coral giving you 1 first round ticket.
 
I think we should start with eliminating things that are easily found at LFS or can be readily had at an abundant number of online sources.

Personally, I say we chuck the all the 5 polyps zoas and potentially the 4 polyp ones too.

EDIT: Just realized strikethrough doesn't show up on tapatalk - marked with eliminate as well now.

BONUS CORALS
Zoas/Palys
5 polyps - Chong Bongs
5 polyps - Purple People Eaters (Eliminate)
5 polyps - Vivid Rainbow Zoas
5 polyps - Rasta (Eliminate)
5 polyps - Emeralds on Fire (Eliminate)
5 polyps - Armageddons
5 polyps - Magicians (Eliminate)

4 polyps - Flaming Zebras
4 polyps - Yellow Brick Road
4 polyps - Blue Hornets (Eliminate)

3 polyps - Blondies (BBEB) (Eliminate)
3 polyps - CRC Candy Apple Blues
3 polyps - Gatorades (Eliminate)
3 polyps - Fruit Loops (Eliminate)
3 polyps - Goblins Fire (Eliminate)
3 polyps - Gold Mauls
3 polyps - Maryjanes
3 polyps - My Clementines
3 polyps - Pink Hallucinations
3 polyps - Prometheans
3 polyps - WWC Laser Lemons
3 polyps - YR Peachy Blues

2 polyps - CRC Blue Angels
2 polyps - Alien Acne
2 polyps - Blue Lagoon
2 polyps - Candy Apple Reds
2 polyps - KH Sunburst
2 polyps - KO Nightmares
2 polyps - LC Petroglyphs
2 polyps - Paradise
2 polyps - Pink Hippos
2 polyps - RR Banana Boat
2 polyps - Seduction People Eater
2 polyps - Tyree Orange Rainbows
2 polyps - Tyree Space Monsters
2 polyps - Utter Chaos (Eliminate)
2 polyps - WOWs
2 polyps - Yodas

1 polyp - ASD Rainbow Ring Pharaoh
1 polyp - Butt Munchers
1 polyp - Darth Maul
1 polyp - Oompa Loompas
1 polyp - Rainbow Kazoo/Latin Lovers
1 polyp - Rainbow Rhinos
1 polyp - WWC Pink Krakatoa
1 polyp - White Velvets
1 polyp - RR pink diamonds


Soft Corals
2 Colors or More 1-1/2" min – Ricordea Yuma (Eliminate)
Pink Ricordea Florida
2 Colors or More – Rock flower Anemone
Rainbow Bubble Tipped Anemone
Red St. Thomas Mushroom

Ultra Corals

Zoas/Palys
1 polyp - Adonis
1 polyp - ASD Leprechauns
1 polyp - Wowser/Bowser/Hyper Candy/CandyAppleOrange
1 polyp - Flaming Mohican
1 polyp - GB Emperor
1 polyp - Hallucination
1 polyp - JF Askrak
1 polyp - JF Acid Reflux
1 polyp - JF Bloodshot
1 polyp - Speckled Krakatoa
1 polyp - Rainbow Maul
1 polyp - Ultimate Chaos
3 polyps - RR pink diamonds (Eliminate)

Soft Corals
Dolphin Pet Village Bubbled Tipped Anemone
Dime Size - Gonzo Golden Dragon Mushroom
Nickel Size - Forest Fire Rhodactis aka Sexy Corals Superfreak Mushroom
Highlighter Pink Ricordea Yuma
Baby Jawbreaker/Tye Dye Mushroom
Bounce Mushroom
Eclectus Mushroom
Interstellar Mushroom
Kryptonite Mushroom
 
JVU said:
I agree that having some of the same corals on both the bonus and ultra lists is not very useful, and can be confusing as we saw at the swap.

That said, I’d be fine with people getting credit for 2 bonus tickets for a bonus frag that grew to twice (or more) the polyp count or size required.

I’m also wondering if there is a place for giving bonus credit for corals that normally would not count as bonus, but that are given in much larger size/quantity? Like colony size. I would think this would have been discussed before. It would be a real-time judgement call since you can’t list every possibility.

Also I suggest renaming the bonus round to “first round”, with “first round tickets”. This would be a more familiar naming for new members, since it is already used broadly, for example in draft picking. Lots of people are confused by the overlapping terms bonus round, bonus tickets, bonus corals, ultra corals. We could keep the names and rules of 3 bonus corals giving you 1 first round ticket, and 1 ultra coral giving you 1 first round ticket.
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I like the idea of "First Round" tickets a lot! It would minimize confusion.
 
Personally I disagree with removing utter chaos and bbeb from the list because they are still pretty desirable and with utter chaos somewhat valuable
 
Kremis said:
Personally I disagree with removing utter chaos and bbeb from the list because they are still pretty desirable and with utter chaos somewhat valuable
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I suggested removing not based on value/cost, just that it is readily available from a lot of vendors and a lot of hobbyists. I think bonus should be made up of things that are harder to come by. Not just what it costs. I by no means discourage still bringing it to the frag swap. But I could easily be convinced just upping the polyp count required.
 
I think utter chaos is more valuable and desirable than almost anything else on that list, so I’d keep that one at least.

There is hardly anything on the lists that can’t be purchased, so I’m not sure how helpful of a metric that is. Whether or not it can be purchased locally easily is highly dependent on where you live. For me, practically nothing can be purchased locally easily, but online everything is easy.

I guess it’s a philosophy and definitely debatable, but for me it is better to have a more inclusive bonus system so a greater number of people are incentivized to bring greater numbers of better corals.

I’m pretty sure at the last swap the people bringing lots of corals were the same ones bringing bonus corals. Without as many bonus corals there would be less reason to bring multiple desirable corals.
 
For the Zoa Paly the 5 polyp ones go to the removal the others increase the polyp count. The only ones I saw a lot of were the magicians and the rasta. The others I think I saw 3 frags of all the others marked for deletion.
 
im more in favor of increasing polyp count requirements than to eliminate corals from the list. i also think putting a + after the number is a good idea so people dont feel they need to just put the minimum requirement to get it counted as bonus or ultra. the only bonus zoa i saw a lot of was rasta with 5 polyps in the 3rd round. this tells me that 5 polyp rasta is not a bonus coral. maybe 15+ polyps would be a better fetch.

i like the idea of assigning a value to ultra and bonus corals. if ultras were $90+ and bonus were $30+ (hobbyist prices, not retail) then there would be a metric to go on. we got a good idea of how much people are willing to pay for corals from the auction.

if corals do not make it on the bonus list, do people still bring them? sunny d zoa is not on the list and i did not see any at round D. a lot of people might have it and it might be easily attained through the marketplace, but yet i didnt see any at the swap. if the list gets dwindled down, is it safe to say that we will see less bonus frags, as well as diversity, and more non-bonus frags?
 
glee said:
im more in favor of increasing polyp count requirements than to eliminate corals from the list. i also think putting a + after the number is a good idea so people dont feel they need to just put the minimum requirement to get it counted as bonus or ultra. the only bonus zoa i saw a lot of was rasta with 5 polyps in the 3rd round. this tells me that 5 polyp rasta is not a bonus coral. maybe 15+ polyps would be a better fetch.

i like the idea of assigning a value to ultra and bonus corals. if ultras were $90+ and bonus were $30+ (hobbyist prices, not retail) then there would be a metric to go on. we got a good idea of how much people are willing to pay for corals from the auction.

if corals do not make it on the bonus list, do people still bring them? sunny d zoa is not on the list and i did not see any at round D. a lot of people might have it and it might be easily attained through the marketplace, but yet i didnt see any at the swap. if the list gets dwindled down, is it safe to say that we will see less bonus frags, as well as diversity, and more non-bonus frags?
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I totally agree
 
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