The main issue is costs drive us to be basically coral fraggers....to sustain this hobby. Those of us without expendable income. It's not anyones fault, and it is the way it is and always has been. But does it have to be anymore? I like what the other Chris said, lets start a community, and maybe group buy ins and stuff like this. My original intention for this post wasnt to bash the hobby, but to try and save it. When an animal costs upwards of $250 per head, this hobby has become super inflated. Is what its boiling down to.
I think this is a great conversation to be having.
$250 corals only exist because we choose to buy them. If a coral is so extremely rare that it really deserves $250, then maybe it should be in the ocean. And if a coral is such a poor aquarium inhabitant that it can't be fragged routinely once established, it also should probably stay in the ocean.
In a way this is already happening. For example, how many branching hammers do you see posted for every wall hammer you see posted? Easy to frag corals that are easy to grow are what actually survives in this hobby.
Now of course, people will have that coveted coral that they MUST have that they're willing to shell out the money for. But if that coral is well cared for, it too will one day be growing out of the water or into the neighboring coral, and it will NEED to be broken into frags. My thought is that as local reefers, we can drive down the costs of corals to make the hobby more accessible for everyone.
Costs have just gotten out of hand. Last night I was looking on our forum for info about a pump I want to buy and I saw a post from 2012 where two members were complaining to each other about the cost of the pump going up to an outrageous $80. Bulk reef currently sells the pump for $189. That's not inflation, it's greed.
There will always be some people who have the resources to buy whatever they want, whenever they want it. All I can say is that I hope those people spread the cool corals through the club when they have frags.
Years ago I saw jawbreaker mushrooms for like a thousand dollars a polyp. Man did I want some. Fast forward a few years, and I bought some from a local reefers for like $45 a polyp. I still think $45 a polyp is insane to spend for a mushroom, but it is beautiful and it is better than $1k.
I'm really proud of the fact that with the exception of a few ricordea, every coral in my tank is locally and sustainably aquacultured. As a bonus I've gotten some great deals and met some really cool people who I would have never otherwise come across.
I guess what I'm saying is that to me, the BRS
IS the community you mentioned, informally. For that to work we have to collectively buy into the idea that this is a place to pass on good deals to local reefers and to buy things that are reasonably priced from each other. This idea of selling frags for full retail, or buying big wild colonies and chopping them up for sale should just end.
Boston reefers member Joe Rice set a great example last spring when he was giving away frags of his way too giant forest fire digi.
It would be really cool to start seeing members do fragging group buys of big corals from other members. If we ever have in person meetings again, I could imagine a person bringing a big coral that's outgrown it's space and selling frags for $10 each and probably making more money than if they sold the colony on the site.
Haha end rant.
