UUUgghh Crabs!

[land shark]

I am officially never buying another crab. I broke down and bought an emerald for a bubble algae problem. The damn thing hides for a week and when it finally decides to come out I find it with my most prized singe head zoa in it's mouth. I even sat at the store for over an hour debating it because I was worried about this exact situation. Not a single bubble algae was eaten and now I lost one of my favorite pieces that just started looking good again. The worst part is that it was one of the only corals left from my last coral purchase. An ebayer didn't list that he had aquacultered corals for sale and I was riddle with flatworms and monti eating nudies. I bought hundreds from the guy and lost it all but that zoa. I also lost all of my montis and acros despite a lot of effort in trying to fix the issue. It's no wonder people leave the hobby so much. I have nothing but bad luck in reefing and I have been doing it since 2004. Maybe I can replace some stuff at an upcoming swap.  I really don't know how people keep reefs without just putting endless amounts of money and nearly fruitless effort into the tank. I have a feeling it's a ton of luck as well. Pretty sure I will never have a good looking reef...

[patback]

1 minute ago, land shark said:

.  I really don't know how people keep reefs without just putting endless amounts of money and nearly fruitless effort into the tank.

This is exactly what the hobby is. 

in all seriousness, I dont even dip new coral. The effort comes in for me by  only buying from select trusted sources and even then, I SCOUR each little nook and cranny of every piece and remove anything off of it thay is not necessary.  (Rubble, plugs, dead spots, etc.  

now if I was putting a couple hundred worth of pieces in, then I wouldnt add anything without including a quality dip.  

I like little surprises though, the only things I really wouldnt want are aefw, monti eating flat worms, and nudibranchs.  

imo, dipping for all three are sort of a catch 22, in that you can kill the adults but if there are eggs, there will be more to come.  

[patback]

Sorry to hear about the bad luck though.  I have had a few major losses and twice that I sort of thought, mehh, I think I'm going to sell everything off.  

Not so coincedentily... the losses were always from my negligence, either not having a plan for power outages, adding pieces without any precaution, or relaxing on my maintenance. 

[Tamberav]

31 minutes ago, land shark said:

I am officially never buying another crab. I broke down and bought an emerald for a bubble algae problem. The damn thing hides for a week and when it finally decides to come out I find it with my most prized singe head zoa in it's mouth. I even sat at the store for over an hour debating it because I was worried about this exact situation. Not a single bubble algae was eaten and now I lost one of my favorite pieces that just started looking good again. The worst part is that it was one of the only corals left from my last coral purchase. An ebayer didn't list that he had aquacultered corals for sale and I was riddle with flatworms and monti eating nudies. I bought hundreds from the guy and lost it all but that zoa. I also lost all of my montis and acros despite a lot of effort in trying to fix the issue. It's no wonder people leave the hobby so much. I have nothing but bad luck in reefing and I have been doing it since 2004. Maybe I can replace some stuff at an upcoming swap.  I really don't know how people keep reefs without just putting endless amounts of money and nearly fruitless effort into the tank. I have a feeling it's a ton of luck as well. Pretty sure I will never have a good looking reef...

Sorry for the troubles, I got rid of my bubble algae with manual removal. Easy to do if you have a nano. I used a tweezers and It eventually just stopped coming back. 

 

I almost always dip corals. I would never trust someone on ebay... or anything from random venders at a frag swap. The only corals I didn't dip were from Battle Corals and Boom Corals. 

[land shark]

The mostly fruitless effort I refer to is constant dipping scraping and such. I dipped everything in bayer and revive and scraped with a butter knife. I dipped and scraped like crazy after I knew there was a problem but I just couldn't stop it. I think a qt is what would have saved me but I just don't have the space. I bought from someone who had tons of positive feedback too. I am just mostly upset about the crab though as people always say to buy them and they suck. I have never had a good one that takes care of any issues.