VT reefers!

[fish farmer]

I've stopped in Waterbury on 5 occasions and never caught it open, so I'm guessing the retail traffic was enough to keep retail hours. It's hard to say if Vermont could support a REAL fish store in the internet age. I tried! I'd always rather support someone locally if at all possible.

I grew up in Lebanon and remember when Lebanon Pet opened that store. It was incredible back then (30 years ago?). Kind of sad to see it now.

I drove to Florida last week, and stopped at Worldwide Corals. That place is incredible. Now that I've seen it, I probably won't be satisfied with any store!

I think Green Mountain gets his corals from WWC so much easier to buy from the source.

We used to have a couple of up and coming reef stores years ago. Milton Mini Reef, that was over 10 years ago, don't think they lasted more than a few years. Another was in Essex, but Joel also worked days at IBM so hours were odd, he lasted a couple of years. Then there was the talk of a wholesaler of marine stuff opening in Winooski....no idea why Winooski was a good location, but when our club was still going we were fully expecting tours of the place, they never opened and the guy in Essex bought a bunch of their stuff at auction.

20 years ago there was the Pet Advantage, Green Mountain Aquarium, Noah's Ark, Green Mountain Tropical Fish (Rutland) and some other place in Rutland. The last three has some saltwater, but didn't have corals. I literally had to drive to Massachusetts to find a healthy Hippo Tang as the two I found at the named stores didn't look well. I drove all the way down to CT for the best cured Fiji rock in New England at the time...another place that has come and gone.

 

[Bailey VT]

I would do a mangrove tank again if I didn't have cats and more space. Even a simple 40 breeder with a sump in the back with the island part there, but trained with feeder roots going into the reef.

I actually just brought back 3 mangrove seeds to try to grow in my refugium with my macroalgae! The refugium actually sits next to my tank on my house plant shelf, under a bank of grow lights. Seems to be working. We'll see if the mangrove seeds are happy soon enough. (For some reason our 8 cats leave it all alone!)

 

[Eric R.]

facias

I meant favias. Dang autocorrect. (Funny R2R auto changes da*n to dang).

I actually just brought back 3 mangrove seeds to try to grow in my refugium with my macroalgae! The refugium actually sits next to my tank on my house plant shelf, under a bank of grow lights. Seems to be working. We'll see if the mangrove seeds are happy soon enough. (For some reason our 8 cats leave it all alone!)

Neat! Is it a display fuge then? Have you done some reading on mangrove care and do you know what species they are? Do you have them in any sort of substrate? Also what macros do you have in your fuge?

 

[Bailey VT]

I meant favias. Dang autocorrect. (Funny R2R auto changes da*n to dang).



Neat! Is it a display fuge then? Have you done some reading on mangrove care and do you know what species they are? Do you have them in any sort of substrate? Also what macros do you have in your fuge?

"Display" might be a a little generous, but it's a shallow 7 gallon clear tub with some rock and sand in it and 2 kinds of red gracillaria from Algae Barn (red ogo and pom pom I think). I had some chaeto as well, but I think it froze in transit, as it quickly bleached out and died. I have more chaeto coming with some corals from Cultivated Reef next week. I will probably put a couple shrimp or crabs in there as well just for fun, as I can see it, and the tank from my desk. I also just got a Scopas Tang and a Starry Blenny, so it should give me plenty of food for them.

I'm pretty sure I have red mangrove seeds. My folks have a condo that abuts a a big mangrove stand/lagoon, and a bunch of them had seeds that were germinating. I haven't done much research yet. I don't know if they will be happy rooting into the sand or if I need some sort of mud/muck for it. I'm not too crazy about the idea of adding something silty to the system, but maybe!

 

[Bailey VT]

(And yes yes, I know I'm breaking the law with a small tang in a 40, but I will guarantee a new 125 will be up and running long before it outgrows the current situation.)

 

[VermontReefs]

Greeting my VT friends! I'm in West Arlington, VT on the Cambridge border. Good to see a couple other folks in Vermont.

My wife and I moved here from Colorado in June to be closer to her family. She's originally from NH and I'm from Arizona lol. Now in Vt to stay.

I've been out of the reef game for 10 years due to my business but now that I sold...I'm back at it! I was in charge of Marine Aquarium Society of Colorado at one point and would love to have that out here. Anyhow hopefully we can stay connected and eventually get a group back together.

We just purchased our farm so my build hasn't started quite yet...waiting on my Cade 900 S then the fun begins! What tanks are you guys/gals working with?
(105 gallon total)

 

[fish farmer]

Greeting my VT friends! I'm in West Arlington, VT on the Cambridge border. Good to see a couple other folks in Vermont.

My wife and I moved here from Colorado in June to be closer to her family. She's originally from NH and I'm from Arizona lol. Now in Vt to stay.

I've been out of the reef game for 10 years due to my business but now that I sold...I'm back at it! I was in charge of Marine Aquarium Society of Colorado at one point and would love to have that out here. Anyhow hopefully we can stay connected and eventually get a group back together.

We just purchased our farm so my build hasn't started quite yet...waiting on my Cade 900 S then the fun begins! What tanks are you guys/gals working with?
(105 gallon total)

What part of Arizona? I worked in Phoenix for a year when there were only 2 million people there. I have family and friends in different parts of the state still. The wife and I were planning a trip out there last March, but that didn't happen.

There is a Tropical Fish Club in Burlington which has some reef members as well as an Otter Valley Tropical Fish Club centered around Rutland which I think is more FW and small, I hear they pretty much stop meeting in the summer time. The same thing happened when we ran the Vermont Marine Aquarist club, no one wanted to do meetings in the summer.

I'm currently running a 29 gallon DT/20 sump as my reef which is in a wall between my living area and kitchen. I had a refuge attached to this system call "Al's Atoll", my attempt at a saltwater paludarium. It was a 65 gallon with the overflow chopped down with dry rock and a terrarium style back wall, mangroves and some salt tolerant plants. It worked for a while, but I wasn't dedicated to it and recently rebuilt it to house fish and rock from a 120 gallon tank I maintained for 20 years at a local campground which I tore down on Friday. I'm just waiting for the call from the new owner to help load the 6 foot beast into his van.

I'm in the downsizing mode, slowly moving out fish stuff collected. I have two empty 55 gallon tanks that I will never set up as tanks in the house, maybe baitfish tanks. Also once the 65 gets taken down that will probably go away as well.

 

[Bailey VT]

Okay the tank is getting a little full....

I got orders from Cultivated Reef and Worldwide Corals this week. Both orders arrived in perfect shape.

WWC has a coral club. If you sign up for 3 months or more, it's $94/ month, which includes overnight FedEx shipping. For that price they sent 5 corals which would each sell for more than $50. You can request which types you're interested in, and I have specified LPS, Softies, and Zoas. So I got 2 nice zoas, 1 Chalice, 1 Favia, and 1 Rhodactis.

For me the best part is that you can add on to this order from their website and from eBay. So I bought some shrimp, snails, and an urchin and added to the order, and I won a handful of cheap frags from them on eBay. I was in Orlando last week and picked out this 4" Trachy, which ALSO shipped in the same big package (with a tote bag and some trial filter media). I'm really impressed with their operation and logistics.

Cultivated reef was great too. Very communicative, and it's nice to support other New Englanders. Their prices were very fair as well and the frags are doing great.

I had 2 orders from other sources arrive during the Christmas rush, and they were both chilled, and I had some losses. I would say it's 95% safe to order in winter from most places, just avoid the holiday rush. It also helps to check for clear weather in Memphis TN, as that's the FedEx hub where it all comes through. (Louisville, KY for UPS). If the package can keep moving, it has a good chance of getting to you in good shape.

At this rate I need to get a frag tank ASAP!

 

[fish farmer]

Okay the tank is getting a little full....

I got orders from Cultivated Reef and Worldwide Corals this week. Both orders arrived in perfect shape.

WWC has a coral club. If you sign up for 3 months or more, it's $94/ month, which includes overnight FedEx shipping. For that price they sent 5 corals which would each sell for more than $50. You can request which types you're interested in, and I have specified LPS, Softies, and Zoas. So I got 2 nice zoas, 1 Chalice, 1 Favia, and 1 Rhodactis.

For me the best part is that you can add on to this order from their website and from eBay. So I bought some shrimp, snails, and an urchin and added to the order, and I won a handful of cheap frags from them on eBay. I was in Orlando last week and picked out this 4" Trachy, which ALSO shipped in the same big package (with a tote bag and some trial filter media). I'm really impressed with their operation and logistics.

Cultivated reef was great too. Very communicative, and it's nice to support other New Englanders. Their prices were very fair as well and the frags are doing great.

I had 2 orders from other sources arrive during the Christmas rush, and they were both chilled, and I had some losses. I would say it's 95% safe to order in winter from most places, just avoid the holiday rush. It also helps to check for clear weather in Memphis TN, as that's the FedEx hub where it all comes through. (Louisville, KY for UPS). If the package can keep moving, it has a good chance of getting to you in good shape.

At this rate I need to get a frag tank ASAP!

Glad you had success with shipping!

I had some live shellfish shipped up from Rhode Island right before Christmas, Fed Ex Overnight, spent the night in Memphis so I got it in two days, at least that is supposed to be kept chilled.

 

[Eddie_K]

Hey everybody! Just joined up and wanted to introduce myself. I'm in the process of setting up my first reef tank after wanting one for years. Glad to see there's at least a few others as crazy as I am here in Vt!

 

[fish farmer]

Hey everybody! Just joined up and wanted to introduce myself. I'm in the process of setting up my first reef tank after wanting one for years. Glad to see there's at least a few others as crazy as I am here in Vt!

Greensboro...that's up there. There use to be a guy up in East Haven...he was too far away for coral trading .

 

[Eddie_K]

East haven isn't too far from me if he's still around. We're lucky enough to live close to my parents and my Dad works all over the state. So if anyone wants to trade me some live rock or corals for...umm...some scraps of dry rock? lol. Happy to be here

 

[VermontReefs]

Good to see some VT folks responding. Anyone looking to get a group going again? I wonder how many cumulative people reef in this state or nearby lol?

 

[Eric R.]

Getting a pico setup right now, and working on rehoming the inhabitants in my 55g tank to set that up as well. I'm in Jericho though, so unfortunately not all that close.

 

[fish farmer]

Good to see some VT folks responding. Anyone looking to get a group going again? I wonder how many cumulative people reef in this state or nearby lol?

I'm always open for meetings, usually willing to travel about 2 hours, time can be precious though. I work one weekend a month and once the nice weather comes reefing takes a back seat.

 

[cconnolly]

Vermonters in exile here. Wife and I used to live in Lincoln and then Bolton but work took us down south. With work allowing us full time remote now we are thinking about coming back sooner than later. So been holding off on setting up a big boy tank until we do. So we just keep playing with our nano tanks.

We used to be neighbors with Matt the owner of Green Mountain corals when he lived in Bolton. Is he still the only real shop in state? Does everyone just get stuff shipped in from internet shops? We always had issues with FedEx when we lived there so can only imagine in winter it can get dicey. Is best bet just going down to Albany or Boston and bringing stuff back with you?

 

[fish farmer]

Vermonters in exile here. Wife and I used to live in Lincoln and then Bolton but work took us down south. With work allowing us full time remote now we are thinking about coming back sooner than later. So been holding off on setting up a big boy tank until we do. So we just keep playing with our nano tanks.

We used to be neighbors with Matt the owner of Green Mountain corals when he lived in Bolton. Is he still the only real shop in state? Does everyone just get stuff shipped in from internet shops? We always had issues with FedEx when we lived there so can only imagine in winter it can get dicey. Is best bet just going down to Albany or Boston and bringing stuff back with you?

Property is getting spendy up here....seller's market. My wife's boss retired, sold their house in Bristol for a lot more than they expected and moved to Florida...but they still come north to visit in the summer.

Yes GMA is still the only brick and mortar store devoted to reef stuff and his hours are weird. I've only been to his shop once and I got lucky that he was there.

Reefbum.com is in Vermont, but only does online sales of mostly SPS.

I only get stuff shipped from April to October, risky in the summer depending on how hot it is. I used to travel down country, western Mass has Aquadreams and there are several "newer" stores around southern NH and Boston area that I've yet to check out.

 

[Medical_Reef]

Hey all! Down in white river junction myself, have a little tank, but two quick questions.
1) is anybody interested in free fish? Talbots damsel and a clown goby need new homes.
2) does anybody have a par meter? Would love to borrow one…

thanks!

 

[Nach0311]

Hi All. St. Albans here. Just getting back into things. Had a Fish and live rock a few years back, and now looking to get back into starting a a small reef cube with some fish and corals. Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[hawgger]

Hello, New reefer from Burlington here. Started a biocube 32 couple weeks back.