Are the costs of our hobby discouraging newcomers?

[Magellan]

thats a great tank, I learned more about Peltiers than i ever wanted to know haha. They exist up to 500 watts now so I think a native tank nano all in one is possible. i have this little tank set up with a few thing I have collected.

Love the natural look! Like an undersea garden

I had an idea to try and capture energy loss from high voltage power lines using peltier units and capacitors but couldn’t ever get it to work :/

 

[Hulgarth]

Love the natural look! Like an undersea garden

I had an idea to try and capture energy loss from high voltage power lines using peltier units and capacitors but couldn’t ever get it to work :/

I thought of something similar but they are crazy inefficient. You would enjoy this guys channel if you have never seen it, I think youtube links are ok.

 

[Magellan]

I thought of something similar but they are crazy inefficient. You would enjoy this guys channel if you have never seen it, I think youtube links are ok.

Oh there’s all sorts of issues, most importantly the cost vs benefit problem...I think I’m going to be watching every video on this channel lol

 

[Bleigh]

I’m newish to the salt water side of the hobby. It hasn’t even been a year that I’ve had my salt tank. That being said, I’ve had lots of commercial and research experience in the salt water environment. I’ve had different kinds of fresh water environments for more than 2 decades. My family wanted to do salt about 4 years ago and I flat out refused because everything that’s involved. I was fine with a fresh water biocube and would see how much they enjoyed it before I was willing to upgrade to salt. I will say that I didn’t try salt sooner simply because of everything involved and imo, to do salt without corals would be a shame... so... mixing salt, dosing, skimmers, refugium, reactors, lights, fans... I wasn’t sure I wanted to deal with all that. I’m not sure I would have upgraded from the biocube if it hadn’t of been for this community. Everything was growing well and it was beautiful. Now I’d love to have a tank big enough that I am literally in over my head. ;Hilarious I honestly think it depends on the support someone has. I cannot imagine going it alone and continuing to grow in the hobby. I’m sure some would, but not many.

 

[ca1ore]

Probably mine will be a minority opinion, but I tend to see the high cost of entry for the hobby as a good thing because it means that folks who do enter do so because they really want to and not just on a whim.

 

[ZoWhat]

Absolutely there is an "entry fee" of a couple of thousands of dollars to do this hobby, any hobby realky...

A brief list of hobbys / clubs that you can not be in the hobby for $500 or less... or even a $1000 or less;
* Harley Davidson enthusiast
* Gun / Riffle collector
* Serious weekend golfer
* Fly fisherman
* Muscle car enthusiast
* Garden landscape enthusiast
* Serious bicyclist

.... list goes on and on. You take on a hobby, any hobby, expect it to be in at least a $1000 or more



.

 

[MnFish1]

Did not read the whole thread but there is a big diff in cost between a fish only tank versus fish and stony coral combined. I think we should still consider some corals for advanced hobbyists and not mix in those costs for people new to the hobby.

Because without coral.. I know my costs go down BIGTIME. Even throwing in some hardy softies i could eliminate a lot of my gear and routine.

But nah.. I have to have acro, gigs and haddoni and bta, and fish. So my costs go way up.

I think part of the problem is that people buy enough coral to stock 1 aquariums in the form of frags. Left alone - and in the right conditions - corals will quickly outgrow many tanks. (or competition will kill off neighbors). Im amazed at the number of people who are ordering coral and buying for so often - I often wonder 'whats happening'.

 

[Hulgarth]

Absolutely there is an "entry fee" of a couple of thousands of dollars to do this hobby, any hobby realky...

A brief list of hobbys / clubs that you can not be in the hobby for $500 or less... or even a $1000 or less;
* Harley Davidson enthusiast
* Gun / Riffle collector
* Serious weekend golfer
* Fly fisherman
* Muscle car enthusiast
* Garden landscape enthusiast
* Serious bicyclist

.... list goes on and on. You take on a hobby, any hobby, expect it to be in at least a $1000 or more



.

New tech brings down lots of hobbies cost. Rc planes used to cost 1000s and now can be done for 100 dollars. Starting cheap is great because you really appreciate a lot of the fancy equipment and realise the midrange stuff is often 90% as functional as the top tier stuff. There is for sure a "tax" of salt water equipment because it was niche and people would pay more for stuff in the past. if you go all second hand, start with dead rock and some seed rubble you could have a little reef for a few hundred.

With natives and some pvc for a diy skimmer if you must have one you could build a full system for under $100 dollars for sure.

 

[Spkarim]

Costs are certainly high, definitely a barrier to entry. A novice like myself would have trouble starting for less than $500 even with used equipment.

Sure, it’s not as expensive as amateur race car driving or flying an airplane or antique collection.

However, the list of less expensive hobbies would go on for a very long time. Most people in the world don’t have hobbies with a similar start up cost.

 

[Tamberav]

I don't know.... I see beginners start this hobby and do it fairly inexpensive with a HOB filter, petco tank, jeabo powerhead, and a Chinese led or marine orbit, etc... they often do nano tanks around 10-30g to keep cost down.

I think it is easier to enter this hobby now then ever if a person really wants to.

My early tanks were tanks from the "FREE" section (had scratches but corals don't care about scratches) with a used black box led and used koralia's. Which worked just fine for the cheap beginner/intermediate corals I wanted to keep. I bought dry rock because it was cheaper and so on.

 

[Phildago]

Hopefully... I mean I don't have much money, but I make it work because I love it. I know many others do the same.

The last thing I'd want is for reefing to turn into the voodoo that is the fresh water hobby. "Yeah, just toss a canister filter on there, fill her up with tap water, no heater and do a water change once every 30 years and you'll be fine. If anything dies its because of that water change you did 6 months ago"

 

[jlts21]

I started my 120g with a little over $2500. Now granted, $1200 of that was for a luxury item (neptune apex package) and a larger than necessary skimmer and return pump. So I could've gotten into the hobby for a lot less. I'm well into the $7k+ range in fish, coral and equipment (I honestly don't want to add everything up because I'll probably throw up if I knew how much money I've spent in the past year)

 

[ca1ore]

I think part of the problem is that people buy enough coral to stock 1 aquariums in the form of frags. Left alone - and in the right conditions - corals will quickly outgrow many tanks. (or competition will kill off neighbors). Im amazed at the number of people who are ordering coral and buying for so often - I often wonder 'whats happening'.

Don't know why, but that made me laugh ….. ooooh shiny syndrome I think.

For me personally, my coral outlay over the last couple of years has been a big fat goose egg. I've sold some, bought some and traded for some. Not the case with fish where it's definatley an outlay. My biggest cost is utilities though.

 

[Mastiffsrule]

I don't know.... I see beginners start this hobby and do it fairly inexpensive with a HOB filter, petco tank, jeabo powerhead, and a Chinese led or marine orbit, etc... they often do nano tanks around 10-30g to keep cost down.

I think it is easier to enter this hobby now then ever if a person really wants to.

My early tanks were tanks from the "FREE" section (had scratches but corals don't care about scratches) with a used black box led and used koralia's. Which worked just fine for the cheap beginner/intermediate corals I wanted to keep. I bought dry rock because it was cheaper and so on.

This.

Many of us are so knowledgeable about the hobby we forget the roots. It took buying a cheap tank for me to flash back to my first tanks. I can admit to having a 55 sitting on the floor with a ugf. No light and only fish.

 

[Dennis Cartier]

I don't know about newcomers, but they are certainly discouraging to me, and I have been in the hobby for 30 years. Recently in the GTA (Greater Toronto Area), all the LFS that carry coral have tripled their prices for what would have been average frags and colonies. This saddens me greatly. Although I can afford to pay the inflated prices, I just don't see the point of paying insane prices for something that is so fragile. That is probably the worst part of the situation, most, though not all of the LFS tanks are the places that coral go to die. So seeing nice pieces, or even mediocre pieces with ridiculous prices on them just lessens the chance that the coral will ever make it to a hobbyist's tank where they will have a fighting chance to flourish, and instead they weaken and wane and more often then not perish. Tragic. Not to mention how a new comer would perceive the situation.

The problem is that people do pay these crazy prices. When chiding one of the LFS owners (that I know) about his prices, he assumed I was commenting on how they were so low! When I elaborated about a 1" frag for $549, he shrugged and said they get bought as quick as he can put them up. Unbelievable.

This is setting the stage for the local LFS to rely more and more on fewer and fewer people. One of the local LFS that were one of the trend setters in this regard, is just in the process of liquidating and closing their doors. Go figure.

Hopefully the Indo ban will lift, but I am not sure that LFS's will ever resume reasonable coral prices.

Dennis

 

[Hypan]

The More expensive things get will hopefully come with some benefits. Like better handling and survivability.

I’ve always been surprised how cheap things were in the hobby when I entered long ago. I mean most of the costs at the end user was shipping.lol. I was amazed a Philippine fisherman could pluck a coral from the ocean for a couple bucks and it could end up at my LFS and all it cost me was $40.

Australia hit and everyone was losing their mind over the same coral retailing for $100. But I saw a better chain of custody and a healthier animal. Much better chance for long term success. The benefits far outweighed the costs for me.

You can certainly do a successfull reef on a budget, but spending lots of money doesn’t guarantee a successful reef. You get what you put in.

 

[Aardvark1134]

This week a bananna ducktaped to a wall sold for $120,000. While it's true some rich people are smart... a lot of them got there by luck and are actually very stupid.