"Japanese" Zoas make their return

[mnat]

These zoas popped up in late 2010 and there seems to be a resurgence. I wanted to post a little history on them for those who have not seen them before.

First off: Not from Japan at all. Not sure who added it first, but they just became known as Japanese zoas even though they are from Thailand and Taiwan.

Second: These coming in now are not aqua cultured at all. They can be temperamental only because they are wild caught and can be tough to acclimate in. Add to the fact that people are chopping these up pretty quickly, and you can have some melters on your hands. The main "named" ones from a few years back fruit loops, LA lakers, and emeralds on fire have been aqua cultured for a few years now so you can probably get them from another reefer or store.

Third: These are not expensive, limited or "rare" in any sense of the word. They come in on huge rocks and are very cheap. Do not pay premium prices for misnamed, common, wild caught zoas.




These are already being imported in mass, this was from a vendor on eBay that I follow that had this whole colony for 175$ (not wholsale but retail), and there were a ton of other morphs too. I just wanted to pick one photo to show you the sizes of the colonies and the cheap price.

 

[Troylee]

Deep waters??? lol!!

 

[Reefer831]

Good write up… I'm glad you cleared the whole Japanese name thing… It always irritates me when people claim that they get stuff from a place that doesn't export anything... And then the customer leads to believing the vendor and swears that they know the truth… I've actually been seeing them referred to as Asian zoas lately... Which is a little better fitting of a name...

 

[mnat]

Yeah I just wanted to give people a heads up before they paid massive amounts for these. Personally I like them and will probably pick some up after they have settled in to the hobby. But if you are paying more than say 5-15pp at the highest, then you are getting taken advantage of.

Troylee you are correct, the other adjective thrown on these was deep water which was another marketing ploy.

 

[jbannick22586]

Always awesome when they come in, some vendors will do nice packs for cheap. Can't remember who a couple years back basically got 10+polyp frags of 5 different morphs for 99 shipped which is not a bad deal at all. Of course they melted in a little over a month.

 

[Bruce AZ]

those look like LA laker zoas

 

[kfd]

Yes and no
Japanese? some errr... partly yes, there are some who will sneak up to Jap water to collect illegally, same goes for micro acan. They are all very similar in looking anyway as they are in the same ocean and same current.
and yes, most of them are cheap... and... color will fade in time.. melt if not handling well.. fisherman would just dump the rocks in and out, many of them will end up in fugus
there are exception thou... some are REAL nice and... expensive too

 

[lps1212]

Great write up Mike glad to see this type of thread to inform fellow zoa collectors that the word rare is thrown around very loosely now a days. If you want rare get a Krakatoa but these are by far rare.

 

[joshporksandwich]

Man why you guys making trouble? I'm sure LPS1212 put mnat to it. lol. The trick to these japanesse deepwaters or wherever they come from is high flow and low light.

 

[JMSKI333]

Great Write up! Very educational.

When I first heard of these, I was like "Corals from Japan?? Huh, that's weird, I didn't know they had corals"

 

[miyags]

Someone must of bought them all I couldn't find them.

 

[dirt-nasty-510]

Great right up glad the information is up for all to see

 

[brandon85]

nice write up...

 

[kschweer]

Nice writeup mike. The "Japanese" label is thrown around a lot with acans as well. Looking forward to reading more about zoas and locations.