The Thread
Act II
Now the atmosphere darkens
and the sky becomes turbulent
with a cloud of heresay.
As the curtain to this scene opens, we can feel a light breeze of dismay as Damselblue finds herself getting caught up in "The Thread" ... she stands alone in a harsh world of "too bads" and bad rumors ...
damselblue
I don't think it's funny at all.
=*(
This guy just told me too bad.
There is another post on another thread where a guy ordered 75 pounds of Vava'u and he was only sent 50 pounds.
The guy told him the same thing.
Too bad.
So I am a little upset.
Plus I found a coral eating snail in it which I wouldn't have found without the dip.
Damselblue has now repeated something in which she has no positive proof of truth.
Yet, she has chosen to use it as a weapon against the company which she feels has wronged her.
She has bought a story for which she has paid a steep price, although does not realize.
Damselblue's steps should be choosen carefully ... or, she may find herself sinking into a negative situation from which there may be no escape.
Act III - Scene One
Voice of Reason
On the other hand, live rock is not like fish if it arrives dead ..."you can send it back!"
With live rock, you can't send it back, it basically comes dead with all the life practically guaranteed to grow back if you don't screw it up.
Once you order live rock, you're pretty much on your own to cycle it, rid it of pests and revive the rocks while under your care.
Some rocks look and bounce back better than others, even if it's the same (Fiji Premium) rocks for instance.
FishThis
Seriously, live rock is the most overpriced thing in this hobby. I've got 10 lbs. or so in my tank, and 50 lbs. or so of stuff that was dry rock.
Don't worry about it, it'll all look great in a year if you keep the tank well.
It's the air freight that is expensive.
(FishThis doesn't understand the high cost of flying!)
I'm wondering if Damselblue has found her copy of the e-mail that said "too bad" ...?? Since we don't know if either the alledged 25-pound and "too bad" claims are true, FishThis may need to rethink this advice!
hilighter
Even if the high s.g. did kill most stuff ... which I don't think it would ... some stuff surely survived and will start growing once the rock is cured.
Live rock never looks like the stuff in their pictures after it is shipped unless it's shipped fully submerged, which would make the cost WAYYYYY high.
Use a bottle of patience and the rock will look fine.
Voice of Reason
Follow the instructions that came along with the rocks and you should see a steady improvement.
Most places hype how much better their rocks are over everyone else's and put up these perfect looking rock pics full of color and life, but that's not what you get more often than not. It's just great marketing on their part to bait customers.
What you saw in those pics is what you have ... "BELIEVE THAT," it's just gonna take time to see'm regenerate. I'd say three months to a year at most, but you're gonna see improvement steadily ... "just like me."
Sorry I thought it was funny.
Sal
Live rock is really about the shapes, and your rock looks like rounded blocks to me. Not the best shapes.
All of the pieces?
Don't worry about the effects of the dip. It doesn't penetrate far into the rock and most life on the rock will survive.
I know because ten years ago when I didn't know better I gave a shipment of live rock a freshwater dip.
Some things were driven out of the rock, but a lot survived.
All the same - Anyone that tells you "too bad" when you have a valid complaint deserves at least to have trouble getting paid.
Got your credit card phone number ready? Make that call. And thanks for the warning.
How can Sal be sure Damselblue's claims are true?
If they aren't, he may be advising her to commit fraud!
damselblue
I had only heard good things.
I wonder why Damselblue used the word "PEOPLE" ?
Who are all of these people?
Sal
I wonder ... did Sal look at all of the photos ...?
If that's a 40 gallon breeder you have you don't need a lot of rock anyway, not much height in that tank size. You want some branchy or shelflike pieces - something to open up that reef structure some.
Act III - Scene Two
The fine folks on "The Thread" have
been told that the company has told
Damselblue "too bad" in regard
to her complaint.
Damselblue has sent messages to Birdfish ... she has told him that others on "The Thread" totally agree with her regarding her complaints and that everyone agrees with her that her live rock does not look as it is supposed to.
However, what she has not told Birdfish is that she posted to others that he told her "too bad."
So, when Birdfish arrives to read, he discovers what Damselblue has posted, very much to his surprise.
He now joins "The Thread" with some comments of his own in order to set the story straight ...
Damselblue has sent messages to Birdfish ... she has told him that others on "The Thread" totally agree with her regarding her complaints and that everyone agrees with her that her live rock does not look as it is supposed to.
However, what she has not told Birdfish is that she posted to others that he told her "too bad."
So, when Birdfish arrives to read, he discovers what Damselblue has posted, very much to his surprise.
He now joins "The Thread" with some comments of his own in order to set the story straight ...
birdfish
I hate to hear things like this, and even worse hate to have to make public such a discussion.
However, we have no choice it seems, since all being told is not true.
First, no one ever heard "too bad" from our company. Second, no one ever got a box of Vava'u with 50 lbs., it can't be ordered that way. 75 pound boxes is it, though they may vary 5 lbs. either way (and we promptly refund or ask for the balance).
Third, of five e-mails we received from Damselblue over 24 hours, totaling 35 lines, we responded with two e-mails totaling over 25 lines. I can hardly term that "too bad," and think it is quite unfair to characterize it as such.
Here are some things I cut out of the e-mails Damselblue sent us.
Quoted verbatim:
"There were tons of little black bugs and earwig-looking bugs crawling around on the live rock. There were these things. Of course, two of them are snails, brown-looking things? Worms of some sort? Flat worms? They don't look like bristleworms."
(Note ... of course, the "bugs" are marine creatures of some sort.)
"The rock has very nice shapes. Thank you very much. I read online where if you place it in a container with an SG of 1.035, potential predators will come out of the rock. The SG in the tank is only at 1.023. I couldn't raise it higher.
It wouldn't raise even when I put more salt in. After the rock was in there, I put one more cup of salt in the tank. Do you think I shouldn't have done that and that's why it's black? Or is it from the charcoal? I'm just so afraid I did something wrong."
"... I showed others on "The Thread" and they totally agree with me."
"The pieces are nice shapes, but the rock looks like base rock."
~ ~ ~ end of quoted material from e-mails received here ~ ~ ~
All of our rock pictures were taken of boxes on the way to customers. No two boxes of live rock are alike. No picture on our website is artificially colored.
If someone says to us the most important thing is shape, then I would probably not steer them toward Fiji, yet, some of the best pieces I've ever seen are from Fiji.
And our rock is not "WS" rock. It is a small "mom and pop" (family or tribal) operation we support.
We have a curing live rock page on our website, which was one of the first of its sort on the Web, and been much copied now. If someone chooses to ignore that and do it "their way" ~ 1.035 salinty dips ~ then we obviously cannot tell you what will happen, or guaranty our product will be the same when you decide to alter it.
We surely should not be held responsible, or subject to what borders on slander, when someone chooses their own methods over "manufacturer" recommendations.
Obviously rock with all the life described above is not "base rock."
Pouring cups of salt into the tank is recommended where, for what?
As I said in private e-mails, I think Damselblue may have seriously stunned and "set back" the rock, however, in time, I am sure it will be good live rock.
It will be longer than had it not been put in water nearly twice as salty as the ocean, but it will make it, and be good, as many who obviously know what they are doing have said here in this thread.
In looking at say your 2nd and 3rd pictures the shapes look GREAT to me. I see a cave or tunnel, lots of relief.
The color seems faded, but after double salinity, we should expect that.
It will all come back fine.
birdfish
Rad Atom
The vendors really can't win, if someone gets a pest, they complain.
If someone gets rock with no critters living in or on it, they complain.
And the complaints about coralline algae, frankly, are just plain ignorant.
What lives or dies depends on how high the ammonia spikes. That depends on how hot it was during shipping, how it was handled at the vendor's holding tanks, and how you handle it.
Putting it in high salinity is something that I would not do. But, others may, and that is something that only the aquarist, not the vendor, can decide. Some folks like to have bare rock with nothing but the corals that they want living on it. Others want to save as much as they can.
I think that you should be thankful that you didn't get a bunch of small pieces. More often, this is the case. Birdfish: In my humble opinion, this thread does not make your live rock look bad, I think it looks quite nice.
damselblue
Oops! No one said Damselblue was ignorant ...it was said that complaints about coralline algae are ignorant ...
(I think Damselblue may have taken this a bit personally.)
If you go to the website I have mentioned previous times, you will see that treatment is recommended.
I can't win here.
I guess I'm just one of those stupid people in the hobby that experienced people cannot stand.
I'm here to learn.
At least I am not the only one that came forth with getting rock that was not as expected.
Not as expected ????
I didn't know the other customer said
the rock was "not as expected!"
... I thought he was claiming
he didn't get enough of it !!
Shorting a man 25 pounds and not making up for it is very, very, very poor customer service.
I will order from another company if I ever do order live rock again ... their customer service is outstanding.
I was supposed to get varied pieces in the order thank you. Some LARGER and some SMALLER.
If you private message LadyOctopus, she will tell you. She looked at my rock, she's worked in the business of reefing for 10 years and SHE AGREES WITH ME.
John Q Reefer
Gah!
That's too bad ya got such a raw deal!
Tell ya what, I just don't feel right a righteous person as yourself having to deal with that rock.
Tell ya what I'm gonna do ... you just pack up all that cheesy rock and ship it to me and I'll find a place for it somewhere in my ghetto reef so you don't have to bear looking at it anymore (heheeee ... snickers) ... somehow I doubt I shall be getting a private message asking my shipping addy!
That rock will be simply THE BOMB in 3 months ... FEAR NOT!
Heh ... I got two cinder blocks, an empty Colt 45 can, and a snub nose 38 all covered in coralline in my tank!
...Continue to Act IV
