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What are these Jason Fox names?


Jon Fishman
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What are these  "Jason Fox" things...??   He just a random guy trying to drink @Dr.Fraggenstien 's kool-aid?

 

Seriously though.....  when I look and see all of these random things  (been shopping for Lobo's, torches etc) and they have these ridiculous names etc,  I know they've been named in the past 5-10 years,  so these things aren't being 'discovered'   is there some way of crossing, or dare I say  "Breeding" corals that people are doing to create all of these "designer" things?

 

Is there a whole process behind it?       sometimes I can't tell the difference between a $10 frag of 'multi-colored fun looking"  zoas vs the Boo-Boo-Kitty-electric-lady-land-Paris-Hiltons that cost more than my first car did for a single polyp.

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Some of it is legit and some of it isn't.  The legit aspect, is rare coral/color morphs (might not be obvious to anyone but collectors who see lots and lots of coral, and some times its minute detail or subtle variation).

It's also legit to indicate aquaculture lineage v wild imports.

Other areas it's simply marketing.  Most people tend to be drawn to, and even expect a trade name.  A good example here would be named common lps like hammers and lobes.  These things are imported by the ton, chopped and sold.  They really, in this hobbyist opinion, only need to indicate the region they were collected (e.g., indo torch, aussie scolly, etc), but that doesn't sound as good as PCP Super heater's blazin candy scolly  or whatever.

Some vendors have a nack fir getting ahold of corals that most people can't.  They aren't designing or breeding them themselves or anything like that, but Jason Fox for example will actually travel to the Pacific and spend weeks on kayaks with the islanders, diving and collecting coral for himself.  Doing so, hes able to find pieces that the normal divers (islanders) wouldn't normally collect, simply because they dont understand it is or might be special... most vendors simply import the same old stuff, and that's where something like this has value to the serious acro collector.  One can certainly get red acros for much, much less, but to the hard core types, having this one with the yellow highlights is worth the extra $. 

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Other good examples are colorado sunburst btas and jawbreaker or bounce mushrooms.  If you just want a mushroom or a bra, spend the $5-50 to get a common one.  A lot of people want to be special, so they'll pay the $1500 for the color variant that is hard to get and ever so slightly different (it takes a keen eye to tell a $50 orange and green rainbow bta from a $1500 csb bta, but people will spend that money and then some to have something most others don't).

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LEDs have made a huge difference too in making certain coral more desirable.  

To me it's a lot like collecting baseball cards.  If you just want a card, a few cents (or dollars these days?) will have you covered.  If you want a signed rookie card, you will have to pony up some dough, and that's ok.. it's not ok to call a $5 card a $5000 card though, and that's the only thing I really have a problem with.

With Indo shut down, and rumor on the street is now Vietnam, the days of cheap coral are coming to an end.  With all the attention on the health of the world's reef, maybe someday soon only true aquaculture will be available.  Hell, who knows, even that may be black market only.

The main take away is, out right fraud aside, the market dictates the price as driven by supply and demand.  The supply was high back in the day and the demand was low.  Now, the opposite.  Coral will never again be as cheap as it once was.

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I think prices will come down with time, goofballs like me can grow coral and even get them to spawn.  who knows what will grow in a year or 2.  and when it grows hopefully we will pass it on at reasonable prices.  wild collection of corals will be a thing of the past in a few years as will fish etc. but I'll bet live fish for food will open up and we will be called "aqua farmers" hopefully open to tax breaks and government support! 

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15 minutes ago, jeff70 said:

I think prices will come down with time, goofballs like me can grow coral and even get them to spawn.  who knows what will grow in a year or 2.  and when it grows hopefully we will pass it on at reasonable prices.  wild collection of corals will be a thing of the past in a few years as will fish etc. but I'll bet live fish for food will open up and we will be called "aqua farmers" hopefully open to tax breaks and government support! 

Does government and support even work in the same sentence lol

I agree wild collection will close and I think that is unfortunate for the countries that do it sustainably and need the income. Trading a source of revenue that requires preservation of the reef seems productive for all sides of the argument versus building hotels to pump sewage into the water or mining the reef to make cement. 

It would be a rarity for me to buy a wild harvested any coral as I am stingy and want it to have been successful in captivity for a long time before I lay out money for it, however I see the value in bringing more and cooler things to market also and am glad there are people who do it. 

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