Trustworthy online fish stores?

[Reefing-Around]

Great experiences with WWC. Had an issue on my first order, sent the wrong items. They fixed the order, reshipped all free and kept the wrong items as well. No issues on multiple orders since and have visited the shop in Florida. Very clean, organized, and well cared for facility. Made me want to move!!!

 

[Andrew Mc]

IMHO check out John at Reefcleaners and order a CUC for a tank 1/3 to 1/2 your size.

Just snail and reef safe hermits to start. Error on the side of stocking light. Don’t forget extra empty shells for those hermits!

Add them after properly acclimating per John’s species specific advice.

Wait about month while feeding once a week with pellets - nothing else.

If all goes well, you’re ready to add fish.

Down the road, you can add additional CUC members as needed.

(You can never go too slowly in adding livestock. Nothing goes well adding livestock quickly.)

 

[touchstone88]

Saltyunderground or vividaquariums have NEVER disappointed in my experience. Consider salty’s Specialty-nudibranchs (difficult), and vivids brick and mortar (store). Can’t go wrong with either imho!

 

[lester lloyd]

I’ve tried several online stores it’s best if you get the animal for local pick up instead of door delivery my experience is try to purchase enough to get free shipping a fe good vendors are pet solutions, ny aquatics, blue zoo aquatics, zoa collector and cherry’s and if you quarantine your fish you’ll have a better success rate I have fish I lurched online over two years. So far good luck my friend And nice tank

 

[padafarm]

I order my fish from Live Aquaria. I have only lost one fish from them and I think it was just to small to ship and also a hard to keep fish.

 

[rkpetersen]

They are one of the best stores around.
Also on my list is Saltwater City and Sea King.
All 3 are in that 3 hour round trip window.
Now if I was to hit all 3 in day,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Hah, you just named my regular trifecta of local places to hit up for new livestock.

 

[Mical]

I use Saltwaterfish.com, Vivid Aquariums, Saltys and shop my LFS here in Minneapolis (to support the local LFS') - had good luck with all.

 

[Justin D]

I bought over $5,000 in fish over the years and the best experience is NY Aquatic and the Reef Corner by far hands down I'm building a 850 gallon soon and that's where I'm going for my fish

 

[Coral Newbie]

For Corals I only shop at
World Wide Corals. Order about a dozen times from them no problem. You should check out Mr. Saltwater on YouTube he did a tour of WWC and it was pretty sweet

Jason Fox Corals. Reef builders on YouTube just did a behind screens on his process.

For Fish:
Blue Zoo Aquatics. I have never had a DOA. Customer service is awesome and I like their at home acclimation process and directions they send.

 

[alex.mccann99]

Couple of my favorite stores that not that many people seem to know about.

- www.live-plants.com. Has an awesome selection of Macroalgae, NPS and and other Gorgonians. The pricing for huge Gorgonians is WAY less than and LFS I've seen. I've also ordered Snails from them. Recently started carrying green Ricordeas that turned out to be really great. $4.00 for Green Ricordeas that open up nice and big, mine have bright pink mouths too. I actually just ordered several more for my Ricordea / Acan garden area.

AquariumDepot.com. I use this online store primarily to order their Amphipods / Copepods. They often have packages with free shipping. I attribute my low nitrates and clean substrate to these little critters. Fish love to eat them all day long.

 

[Mfreddy]

I got a healthy purple tang from NYAquatic. My complaints are, 1. Smaller size than advertised, 2. Lower salinity than what I was told the day before shipping. I was able to raise qt tank salinity since there were no fish in it.

I have a healthy little guy that will have to grow in qt.

 

[ReefBum]

@Atul@AmongTheReef

Great service all around. Amongthereef, they are sponsors here.

Agree. I recently used these guys and had a very good experience.

 

[Jennie]

Thanks for the heads up and advice! Any suggestions on dips or medications to get?

I would suggest that you set up a quarantine tank and treat with copper/cp check out this https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/how-to-quarantine.189815/

There are also a lot of threads on this subject. Very helpful.

 

[Tek]

Fish/inverts/corals
Liveaquaria.com

Inverts
Reeftopia.com

For over 10 years these two online stores have always had qualiy livestock and no nonsense customer support. Liveaquaria has a 30 day guarantee and they stand by it.

Be careful of some online stores which are quick to flip and make a buck.

 

[Tek]

For general QT I use a mix of API general cure, Furan 2, Kanaplex. The mix treats parasites/flukes and internal/external bacteria. I do not chance it with any fish because even visually healthy ones may be carriers.

For visible parasites which has progressed extremely far I use copper immediately but raise it accordingly to therapeutic levels.

Also ammonia is the main killer in QT. I do a 25-50% water change every 2-days or at the first sign of stress for the first 2 weeks. Add back the correct amount of medication you removed along with the water change especially with copper treatments. Because of the frequent water changes I am able to experiment with different foods to get them eating but copper will initially dull their appetite.

 

[64Ivy]

Imo, online fish have certainly been coming in a little more 'dirty' (unhealthy) than usual. QT and the knowledge of what you're quaranting for is now more necessary than ever. Fourtunately, a wonderful selection of 'stickies' can be found right here in the R2R Disease Treatment forum. Learn to do your part in the online/delivery process and you'll find it no more of a daunting task than fighting traffic on your way to the LFS. That said, some of my favorite fish vendors are: Live Aquaria (Divers Den), Amongthereef, Zoa Collectors, Pieces Of The Ocean, Pacific Island Aquatics, and NYAquatics.

 

[David S]

I would have to say most of my frags (zoos, lps and SPS) have come from WWC, Unique Corals and most recently from Dan at TCK (The Coral Kings).
I've never been disappointed.

 

[lion king]

I got a healthy purple tang from NYAquatic. My complaints are, 1. Smaller size than advertised, 2. Lower salinity than what I was told the day before shipping. I was able to raise qt tank salinity since there were no fish in it.

I have a healthy little guy that will have to grow in qt.

Super low sg is a direct indicator of managing internal parasites and other diseases. I would immediately treat for parasites and watch very closely for any other diseases to raise it's ugly head.

 

[iemsparticus]

For fish, my go to vendors are LiveAquaria/Divers Den and NY Aquatics. For Corals, my go to vendors are World Wide Corals and Battle Corals. I have nothing but great experiences from all of them... only had 1 DOA with the 16 fish I have ordered between them... and that was a freakish broken back during shipping from Diver’s Den... and they instantly replaced it with no hassles at all... great customer service.

 

[chowwil]

Had no problem with Liveaquaria. Saltwaterfish had bad experience and will never order from them again. Coral was infested with coral eating nudibranch, called them up and they just said picked them out