How to Know if Frags are Dead

[Chrisv.]

Yeah it really did kind of take the wind out of my sails, especially after waiting 3 weeks for them to ship and 3 months into the tank. But I guess this goes with reef keeping…

Nah this is BS.

 

[reefGoat]

They weren’t delayed. They were shipped yesterday around 530 pm and showed up today at 522 pm.

5:22 is pretty late. I would expect a live shipment before noon. Did you pick them up or did they spend all day on a cold truck? Not your fault either way but if that is how shipping is by you, you might need to hold for pickup or only order when temps are favorable.

 

[damsels are not mean]

Man you should get a refund for a lot of that. I see no reason not to keep them and see if any recover but even if they survive you barely got frags with how little tissue survived.

 

[Shooter6]

Unfortunately I don’t have a QT tank, these are literally the first frags I’ve gotten other than a mushroom. But I’m completely ok leaving them in there to see if they show signs of life. The tank is brand new, so it’s not exactly a display tank just yet.

That's fine too I just personally have a 10g coral qt tank I use

 

[Catnip885]

I'm sorry about your frags if you ever decide to shop online again I highly recommend Aquasd we have gotten multiple packages from them the last one was early January and they shipped beautifully and half of our order was sps. I have had a couple coral I thought were absolute goners come back with tender love and care. Keep them lower in the tank for a little bit and feed them well and keep good water quality. Mine were lps that I did this with after I had a power outage last 3 days and they got really cold. Barely any flesh left on them and they are recovering nicely. Don't give up on them until there is absolutely no flesh left. Hopefully some of them make it!

 

[TnFishwater98]

I see a lot of coral websites offering a DOA guarantee. Many require you to email within 2 hours of arrival if something is dead. My question is, how do you know if they are dead and not just stressed out. I just received my first shipment of corals via the internet and here are some photos. 2 hours is not much time to dip, get in the tank and see if they open up. Some of these are looking pretty rough, but others are already showing polyp extension.

Ummmmmmmm, Yeah those don’t look good

 

[zuri]

I see a lot of coral websites offering a DOA guarantee. Many require you to email within 2 hours of arrival if something is dead. My question is, how do you know if they are dead and not just stressed out. I just received my first shipment of corals via the internet and here are some photos. 2 hours is not much time to dip, get in the tank and see if they open up. Some of these are looking pretty rough, but others are already showing polyp extension.

tanks close but not quite ready probably added them at a bad time in the tank's maturity. none of is dead atm from the looks just really unhappy.
from the look of the rock is has just begun a healthy start can see some green coming in when the rock looks forest green should be good to go still yellowish. rock colors up from bone white, brown, yellow , green, blue grey is mature

 

[zheka757]

sorry for your loss, but those all look dead to me.

 

[TnFishwater98]

Unfortunately I don’t have a QT tank, these are literally the first frags I’ve gotten other than a mushroom. But I’m completely ok leaving them in there to see if they show signs of life. The tank is brand new, so it’s not exactly a display tank just yet.

I’m sorry about your first experience, don’t let it deter you. Hopefully suppler will make right.

 

[trevorhiller]

tanks close but not quite ready probably added them at a bad time in the tank's maturity. none of is dead atm from the looks just really unhappy.
from the look of the rock is has just begun a healthy start can see some green coming in when the rock looks forest green should be good to go still yellowish. rock colors up from bone white, brown, yellow , green, blue grey is mature

Yes I know it’s still early, it’s only been going for 3 months. Part of the problem is I was battling Dino’s and had my lights off for a week, so the rocks lightened up a bit during treatment. These were all supposed to be beginner LPS/ sps frags (except the green slimer, but I’ve heard they are pretty hardy).

I anticipated some losses, but not from day 1. Sick of staring at an empty tank.

 

[trevorhiller]

They really weren’t kidding about the pincushions bull dozing frags. Mines wearing a frag corpse as a hat. ‍

 

[TnFishwater98]

Yes I know it’s still early, it’s only been going for 3 months. Part of the problem is I was battling Dino’s and had my lights off for a week, so the rocks lightened up a bit during treatment. These were all supposed to be beginner LPS/ sps frags (except the green slimer, but I’ve heard they are pretty hardy).

I anticipated some losses, but not from day 1. Sick of staring at an empty tank.

You can request to pick up at local UPS /FedEx stores if you have one close by. Seems like the stop at your house is later in the normal route. For me they usually drop at store before my house. I believe the retail stores usually get theirs at 10:00ish. I only live a mile from retail but it keeps it from being in the back of a uninsulated truck for however long. I get my packages delivered to my house before noon usually but this is the best option either way.

 

[TnFishwater98]

They really weren’t kidding about the pincushions bull dozing frags. Mines wearing a frag corpse as a hat. ‍

Hey heads up. If that was a heathy coral and it pinned it through the flesh of that sps, that wouldn’t be good. I don’t own one so can’t speak from experience on pincushions but I would imagine that the sps wouldn’t be happy. If your going to get another order you might want to think about that. 3 months is really early to be trying to keep sps happy. Good Luck…

 

[Shooter6]

I'm sorry, but even the corals that Monty Python would call "not dead yet" are completely unacceptable. You can try to put them in your tank, but it's not okay for a coral to come in minutes from death with a hope of recovering in months.

I hope he makes this right.

I believe we all agree on this, although the current state of shipping makes it hard for any coral being shipped to be ok.
At the same time there's a lot of people who will just toss frags, that could possibly have life left in them and given good water, lights and patience can recover into beautiful colonies.

 

[trevorhiller]

You can request to pick up at local UPS /FedEx stores if you have one close by. Seems like the stop at your house is later in the normal route. For me they usually drop at store before my house. I believe the retail stores usually get theirs at 10:00ish. I only live a mile from retail but it keeps it from being in the back of a uninsulated truck for however long. I get my packages delivered to my house before noon usually but this is the best option either way.

That’s good to know, there’s a UPS store fairly close to my house. The initial delivery said it would be arriving 330 at the latest. I honestly didn’t realize I should try to intercept it.

 

[Shooter6]

These were all ghosted a few months back but I kept them in the qt anyway recently moved them to the main tank, once they started showing life.

 

[Chrisv.]

These were all ghosted a few months back but I kept them in the qt anyway recently moved them to the main tank, once they started showing life.

If your corals looked as bad as his when they arrived, I hope you got a refund.

 

[trevorhiller]

These were all ghosted a few months back but I kept them in the qt anyway recently moved them to the main tank, once they started showing life.

Thanks- I'm going to see if I can save some of them. A few of them still have some tissue that looks viable. Hopefully fish of hex will make it right, especially after the communication issues I experienced. Just would have been nicer if they had a little more of health cushion built in, rather than me trying to nurse them back to health from the start. I am a nurse though, so I'll see what I can do.

 

[Shooter6]

If your corals looked as bad as his when they arrived, I hope you got a refund.

Yes some I got refunded, some from a very well known shipper I was given credit

 

[Shooter6]

Thanks- I'm going to see if I can save some of them. A few of them still have some tissue that looks viable. Hopefully fish of hex will make it right, especially after the communication issues I experienced. Just would have been nicer if they had a little more of health cushion built in, rather than me trying to nurse them back to health from the start. I am a nurse though, so I'll see what I can do.

I've never delt with him, and don't know his doa guarantee is but hopefully they make it right