Aquabiomics Sample Handling Hit A New Low

[CoopsCoralReef]

I’ll chime in here. I sent a sample in around early to mid December. Results were supposed to be available 02/06/26 if I’m not mistaken. I’ve sent 6 emails to their contact email and not a single response. Just a horrible company to work with and a waste of $100.

 

[areefer01]

I’ll chime in here. I sent a sample in around early to mid December. Results were supposed to be available 02/06/26 if I’m not mistaken. I’ve sent 6 emails to their contact email and not a single response. Just a horrible company to work with and a waste of $100.

Out of curiosity did you look at the queue and batch numbers on their portal? Sometimes if an order runs into problems be it shipping, processing, or sequencing they will note the batch number(s) affected and provide an update on the new estimate/eta. In some cases there was no way to salvage and mentioned to contact for a new kit to be sent out.

This was put into play as they received emails asking about delays.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

I’ll chime in here. I sent a sample in around early to mid December. Results were supposed to be available 02/06/26 if I’m not mistaken. I’ve sent 6 emails to their contact email and not a single response. Just a horrible company to work with and a waste of $100.

Did you look up your batch number? There was a delay in processing one batch that as supposed to be released early February and now is late Feb. Not answering emails is an issue though…..

 

[Gulf Live Rock]

We have had a long-standing relationship with Aquabiomics. Eli the owner is a great guy. We do all out testing with them.

 

[GSPClown94]

Eli the owner is a great guy

It is possible to simultaneously be a great guy and a terrible business owner, unless of course your definition of a great guy is dependent on the quality of business one may own.

 

[Gulf Live Rock]

I've had fairly good experiences with them in the past. That said, the "pest free" live rock I got from them had aptasia in two of the boxes, so I wouldn't believe the pest free claims as they 100% are not true.

They are testing for fish disease. Like ich and Uronema. I think that's what they mean by pest free.

 

[areefer01]

They are testing for fish disease. Like ich and Uronema. I think that's what they mean by pest free.

eDNA can also detect aiptasia or so their "what kind of information do you get from the test" indicates.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

eDNA can also detect aiptasia or so their "what kind of information do you get from the test" indicates.

I have a huge question - why don't these eDNA test ever show any human DNA? That is certainly in the database that they use. My hands are in the tanks a lot, and I get scraped up working on cleaning the glass, yet it never shows up in their tests. I had tests that reported terrestrial plants in my samples, but that is easily understood because my office tank is next to my Bonsai collection, and I had an issue with leaf cutter ants carrying bits of those plants into the rim of my tank where they had nested. It may be that human DNA does show up, but they just don't report it, but I'm a bit skeptical......

 

[GSPClown94]

eDNA can also detect aiptasia or so their "what kind of information do you get from the test" indicates.

Funny aiptasia was one that never showed up on my eDNA report but was abundant in the tank when I took the sample. There were a few others that I was expecting to see but didn’t show up in the report. Too many false negatives for my liking.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Funny aiptasia was one that never showed up on my eDNA report but was abundant in the tank when I took the sample. There were a few others that I was expecting to see but didn’t show up in the report. Too many false negatives for my liking.

Some of the eDNA markers are not very refined - they often reference the most closely related species in the database. If Aiptasia isn’t in the database itself, the data will be returned as some general Actinaria. Did you see any anemones on your list?

 

[GSPClown94]

Some of the eDNA markers are not very refined - they often reference the most closely related species in the database. If Aiptasia isn’t in the database itself, the data will be returned as some general Actinaria. Did you see any anemones on your list?

In my report there is a biodiversity overview which lists all the classes found in my sample and Hexacorallia isn't even there, nothing else close to an anemone in my report.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

In my report there is a biodiversity overview which lists all the classes found in my sample and Hexacorallia isn't even there, nothing else close to an anemone in my report.

None of the systems I've tested so far have had visible Aiptasia, so I don't know how those would be reported. Your report had no general Anthozoa listed?

 

[GSPClown94]

None of the systems I've tested so far have had visible Aiptasia, so I don't know how those would be reported. Your report had no general Anthozoa listed?

Here is the sample composition of my report. there was one uncultured sample that made up 4.299 percent of the eDNA so maybe it was that. But also as I mentioned there were a lot of other false negatives in my report.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

In my report there is a biodiversity overview which lists all the classes found in my sample and Hexacorallia isn't even there, nothing else close to an anemone in my report.

Further down in the report, there should be a section like this:

That's where Aiptasia would be - under "other anthozoans".

 

[GSPClown94]

Further down in the report, there should be a section like this:

That's where Aiptasia would be - under "other anthozoans".

Thanks, that's nice to know where Aiptasia should be but the Anthozoa section doesn't exist on my report lol

 

[areefer01]

You will see something like this. From one of my earlier reports:

 

[GSPClown94]

You will see something like this. From one of my earlier reports:

As mentioned in my previous comment, that section does not exist on my report.
I’m not looking for solutions to try and troubleshoot this problem anymore. I reached out to Aquabiomics at least 4 times via email over the span of a few month with questions regarding my report, even called the number listed under their llc and never got a response from them. I finally got a refund but only after filing a complaint with the BBB. Still never got any of my questions answered though…

 

[Wildreefs]

To think some of yall paid $100 to be told what may or may not be present in your water and not be able to do a thing about it crazy. Fortune teller type stuff