Steve and his Animals
Well-Known Member
Just putting my experience here as I left a review on their website, but I don't know if it will actually be displayed because it was rather negative.
A little background, multibar angels (Paracentropyge multifasciata) are my favorite angelfish, period. Something about their body shape, high contrast, and small size makes them irresistible to me (to a fault), despite how notorious they are to get eating. I'm very ashamed of this, as I keep attempting to keep this fish in the hopes that one day I'll get lucky and have one that eats. If my counting is correct, I've had 7 of these in the past 5 years, none of them even glanced at foods I've offered them, including the most recent two from Reef Pro. It's endlessly frustrating and gut wrenching, so I told myself these last two from Reef Pro would be my last attempt at this fish unless I can get some captive bred from Bali Aquarich or Biota.
With this in mind, my experience with Reef Pro was disappointing as well. I ordered two of them back in September. They email me before they ship the fish, asking if I was trying to get a pair since I ordered two and offering me two that had been living together (and eating, supposedly). I eagerly said yes to that offer and was impressed with Reef Pro's attentiveness. Of course, as lucky as I am, the fish get lost in the mail. Incredibly painful to watch that Fedex tracker. I email Reef Pro about the situation, they confirm that Fedex lost them, and look into getting me replacements with another shipping charge.
It takes them around a month to get more of the angels back in stock, which they notified me of, and then explained they wanted to hold them a couple weeks so they can do their "conditioning." Great. I'm so excited at the prospect of keeping this fish successfully that I have no problem waiting. The day comes, they ship the fish, and they arrive in great condition.
Right off the bat, I notice that, while healthy, the two individual angels are not getting along in my QT, in spite of the size (around 40gal) with plenty of hiding spaces. Nothing unusual, just disappointing going from getting a supposed happy pair to this. I think, "no problem, as long as they eat, when they move into the big display maybe they can settle their differences."
Obviously, this doesn't happen. I tried numerous foods to entice them to eat. I ask Reef Pro what they were supposed to be eating at their facility. They send me a list of the basics: mysis, nori, etc. Obviously, these foods were some of the first I tried with not even a glancing interest, on top of options that really should be enticing to most benthic feeders (Arctipods, live blackworms, live mussels, live oysters, chunks of krill, PE mysis smeared onto live rock/mussel shell/coral skeletons): still nothing.
I'm totally lost at this point. Reef Pro says in an email: "these fish are extremely sensitive and need time to adjust to the stress from shipping before they eat again" or something like that. I'm not buying it. I've had other species of fish eat straight out of the bag plenty of times; it's clear when fish are eating before you get them, because there's at least interest. These two multibars acted like every single one before them, not even looking at the food like there was a possibility that it was edible to them. This long rambling post is all to say I feel like I've been lied to, paying over 600 USD for supposedly "conditioned" angelfish. Would you not assume that "conditioned" means at the bare minimum that they eat?
A little background, multibar angels (Paracentropyge multifasciata) are my favorite angelfish, period. Something about their body shape, high contrast, and small size makes them irresistible to me (to a fault), despite how notorious they are to get eating. I'm very ashamed of this, as I keep attempting to keep this fish in the hopes that one day I'll get lucky and have one that eats. If my counting is correct, I've had 7 of these in the past 5 years, none of them even glanced at foods I've offered them, including the most recent two from Reef Pro. It's endlessly frustrating and gut wrenching, so I told myself these last two from Reef Pro would be my last attempt at this fish unless I can get some captive bred from Bali Aquarich or Biota.
With this in mind, my experience with Reef Pro was disappointing as well. I ordered two of them back in September. They email me before they ship the fish, asking if I was trying to get a pair since I ordered two and offering me two that had been living together (and eating, supposedly). I eagerly said yes to that offer and was impressed with Reef Pro's attentiveness. Of course, as lucky as I am, the fish get lost in the mail. Incredibly painful to watch that Fedex tracker. I email Reef Pro about the situation, they confirm that Fedex lost them, and look into getting me replacements with another shipping charge.
It takes them around a month to get more of the angels back in stock, which they notified me of, and then explained they wanted to hold them a couple weeks so they can do their "conditioning." Great. I'm so excited at the prospect of keeping this fish successfully that I have no problem waiting. The day comes, they ship the fish, and they arrive in great condition.
Right off the bat, I notice that, while healthy, the two individual angels are not getting along in my QT, in spite of the size (around 40gal) with plenty of hiding spaces. Nothing unusual, just disappointing going from getting a supposed happy pair to this. I think, "no problem, as long as they eat, when they move into the big display maybe they can settle their differences."
Obviously, this doesn't happen. I tried numerous foods to entice them to eat. I ask Reef Pro what they were supposed to be eating at their facility. They send me a list of the basics: mysis, nori, etc. Obviously, these foods were some of the first I tried with not even a glancing interest, on top of options that really should be enticing to most benthic feeders (Arctipods, live blackworms, live mussels, live oysters, chunks of krill, PE mysis smeared onto live rock/mussel shell/coral skeletons): still nothing.
I'm totally lost at this point. Reef Pro says in an email: "these fish are extremely sensitive and need time to adjust to the stress from shipping before they eat again" or something like that. I'm not buying it. I've had other species of fish eat straight out of the bag plenty of times; it's clear when fish are eating before you get them, because there's at least interest. These two multibars acted like every single one before them, not even looking at the food like there was a possibility that it was edible to them. This long rambling post is all to say I feel like I've been lied to, paying over 600 USD for supposedly "conditioned" angelfish. Would you not assume that "conditioned" means at the bare minimum that they eat?
