Pacific East Aquaculture

Dan the Pieces of the Reef man

2010-01-14T11:18:00.005-05:00

If you've ever been diving on a wild reef, you know that what you see isn't a coral here, a coral there, with lots of space in between. It's a solid mass of corals growing right up next to each other and mixing together. This is the look and feel that we try to recreate with each of our unique Pieces of the Reef, as if we had taken an entire section from the reef and brought it to your home tank.

Dan is the creative mind behind many of our Pieces of the Reef creations. One of his favorite hobbies is pottery, and he brings that same artistic bent to his work on these coral combinations. He carefully selects pieces of liverock that will make interesting and sturdy bases for each Piece of the Reef. Then he decides on the frags to use for that piece, chosing those that will combine to be both attractive and to coexist as peacefully as possible.

Once selected, frags are cleaned up and mounted one by one.

Completed Pieces of the Reef are then placed in one of our holding vats. They will be allowed to grow and fill in a bit to make the piece look more natural before being sold, a process than can take anywhere from a week or two to several months depending on the types of corals being used.

Now the Piece of the Reef is ready to be sold. They are ideal for jump starting a tank as you can place two or three and be well on your way to having a mature, natural looking reef without the long wait for individual frags or corals to begin filling in on their own. We have lots available so make sure you check them out, you may just find one of our carefully constructed pieces is the prefect complement your own tank!

A Christmas Letter to our Customers and Friends

2009-12-22T12:22:00.002-05:00

To all of our Friends and Family, Customers and Fans,

We would like to take a moment to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and Happy Holiday Season, and also to share with you some of our thoughts and experiences from the past year.

Clearly this has been a busy, and sometimes difficult year, for many of us and that's no different here at Pacific East. Many of our challenges this year have been positive. We have continued working with local university students on various projects. New contacts and sources are always being sought after to find the very best maricultured, tank-bred, and captive raised livestock available anywhere. Anyone who's been in to the shop this year can tell you we've done quite a bit of rearanging and upgrading to allow us to expand our in house aquaculture efforts and add some great new chalices and other corals to our LE selection. All of this is part of our continuing effort to offer you the best possible livestock and the best price, and also to do whatever we can to minimize the effects our wonderful hobby has on the environment and natural reefs.

Other challenges we've faced this year have been somewhat less fun. This economy is unpleasant for everyone, of course. And then there are unique problems that can arrise in this business, like the 215 gallon tank that cracked in the middle of the night. But we think those of you who've seen the rebuild will agree that the new tank is every bit as nice, if not nicer, then the one it replaced. Every difficulty is an opportunity to find ways to improve, after all.

And then there's our favorite part of the work we do, interacting with you! We at Pacific East Aquaculture value every chance we have to interact with our customers, be it having a chat at our retail facility, helping you trouble shoot tank problems over the phone, email, and message boards, or just working with you to make sure you have the best possible livestock for your tanks. MACNA was absolutely fantastic this year as were all the smaller regional and club events we were able to attend. We've had the opportunity to host several of the local clubs here at our retail facility, as well as giving tours to local Senior Centers, school groups, Boy and Girl Scouts, and many others. Educating the public about our work is something we take very seriously, and also enjoy immensly.

All and all it's been a good year. Once again we wish you all a fantastic holiday season and we look forward to working with you in the new year!

Your Friends at Pacific East Aquaculture

New Shipment

2009-11-04T16:53:00.007-05:00

We've got lots of great new livestock arriving today and tomorrow. Thought you all might appreciate a sneak peak...

Some of these guys we haven't had in stock for awhile, including sweet little tank-raised seahorses and colorful carpet anemones.

Everyone is nicely acclimated now and getting settled. You'll see better photos on the site once we're all happy and ready to go. We've got a couple more shipments expected tonight and tomorrow, so you never know what other surprises may show up!

Setting Up Our New Display Tank

2009-10-15T11:52:00.006-04:00

Things have been busy at Pacific East Aquaculture lately. MACNA has come and gone and we are moving into the hectic fall season. This week we have been working on setting up a replacement display tank. We had a 215 gallon display set up in the front of our shop for almost 5 years, which cracked overflow to overflow in the middle of the night a couple of months back. Those of you that have had tanks fail know exactly how much fun that was. The replacement tank is a slightly smaller 210 All-Glass dual MegaFlow. Same footprint as before, just a tad shorter.

Setup was fairly uneventful. We only knocked one piece of molding off the wall, and that's easily replaced. Rock is in and has been rearranged half a dozen times.

Water's added, only one minor leak from an old fitting. So far so good. Plus we managed an awesome hitchhiker. Found him swimming around the new tank this morning. Shot's a bit blury but he's a fast little guy. Check him out!

The tank will need a little time to cycle of course, and we still need to get some sand in there. Expect updates as we move forward with it.

2009-08-23T12:07:00.004-04:00

Welcome to our blog.

It's time for an update. Some of you that have followed our blog have seen some of these images before, but some folks have not seen our previous updates. To check the previous updates click on the Archives to the left or if you scroll to the bottom of this page you can click on "Older Posts" and see all our updates.

10 years ago I designed and built Pacific East Aquaculture, Inc. located on the Eastern Shore of Maryland in a land called Delmarva, a peninsula surrounded by the Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean.

I am Dr. Mac, a retired veterinary pathologist. I started keeping saltwater aquariuums in 1968 and as a kid worked for Marine World in the Chicagoland area, at the time they were one of the nation's largest saltwater fish/invert importers, retailers, and wholesalers. I did everything from unpack and acclimate shipments from around the world to communicating with collectors via Telex and calling wholesale accounts and packing orders for retail stores and helping hobbyists design and set up their systems. This experience gave me a solid foundation of knowledge about the animals and the business so that I could create and conduct my current business in a moral and ethical manner.

We operate a retail outlet, mail-order online operation, and wholesale to retail stores around the US. We produce and sell about 10,000 coral frags each year. I also set up a coral farming operation in the Solomon Islands and with the native Solomon Islanders produce many maricultured corals.

I designed my facility with beauty and efficiency in mind. As a kid growing up in the industry I visited many stores around the country and always said that if I ever set up my own facility it would be state of the art and not like the typical "pet shop". Our facility is a coral farm and utilizes an attcahed greenhouse, natural sunlight via Sola Tubes, geothermal heating and air conditioning and also coral system water temp. control, energy effecient 3 HP water circulation pumps, and many other unique designs.

This photo shows some of the hundreds of Chalice coral frags we grow. We grow every type of soft and hard coral.

Here we see some of the 6,000 Zoanthid frags we are currently growing.

Our facility is regularly inspected and is a State of Maryland licensed coral aquaculture facility.

We import directly from overseas collectors and hold a US Fish and Wildlife Service import permit.

Take a look through all the posts on our blog and please visit our website.

Feel free to contact me if you have any questions about my business. I think you will find that we offer something a bit different from the average pet shop, basement coral reseller, or the big-box online mega sellers. I have 40 years of passionate experience in the hobby and have operated our retail operation with a solid reputation for providing knowledgable and friendly professional service. I look forward to serving you soon.

Expanding Propagation Efforts

2009-07-15T15:31:00.004-04:00

We are constantly updating our efforts to captively propagate corals. Recently we added another 12 foot tank for the propagation of more zoas and palys, chalices, and Acans. The tank is illuminated with 400 watt 20,000K metal halides inside Lumen Max fixtures along with T-5 flourescents.

12' Tank with MH and T-5 Lighting

We Grow Several Thousand Frags in each Tank

Our Propagation Process starts with careful examination and multiple dips for all newly acquired stock that is appropriate for propagation based on type and color. In the photo below an intern is shown examining Zoanthid colonies and dipping them in several propietary baths.

The new stock is housed in our greenhouse and examined daily for health.
In the photo below our resident frag expert evaluates each parent colony for growth and determines when frags can be taken for further propagation.

Small frags are taken from the parent colony and then grown into a secondary propagation colony.

Frags for sale are taken from the secondary propagation colony and are examined and cared for on a daily basis.
Below we see some Chalice frags that have grown out into secondary propagation colonies and are now ready to be fragged for sale frags.

Pieces Of The Reef--A Pacific East Aquaculture Exclusive Creation

2009-04-11T14:04:00.005-04:00

Our Pieces Of The Reef are unique cultured corals we offer for sale. We developed the idea for Pieces Of The Reef a couple of years ago following our adventures in coral farming in the Solomon Islands. You can read more about the inspiration behind Pieces Of The Reef here: http://www.pacificeastaquaculture.com/PiecesOfTheReef.aspx

We offer two different sizes, our mini Pieces Of The Reef are typically about 3 inches and our full sized Pieces Of The Reef are about 5-7 inches in length. Each Piece Of The Reef is like a chunk of the real reef. They are pieces of cured live rock that have several cultured corals attached and every one is totally unique.

In the case of our SPS coral, mushroom, soft polyp, and zoanthid Pieces Of The Reef the corals will fully encrust the rock. Our LPS coral Pieces Of The Reef have the corals secured to the rock with super glue and the corals grow upward rather than encrusting the base of the rock.

Pieces Of The Reef are a great addition to any reef aquarium, they are especially nice for nano tanks as you can add just a few small rocks that serve as a base and then stack Pieces Of The Reef on top of this base and immediately achieve the look of a fully established reef. Pieces Of The Reef are economical, instead of buying lots of small frags you can get a Piece Of The Reef and skip all the messy glue work.

Student Internships

2009-02-12T16:20:00.001-05:00

Over the last few years we have had several Salisbury University students intern at our facility. These students have worked on coral propagation technique projects to help us better understand how to more efficiently grow corals. Shown above is Kyle, he is a reef aquarum hobbyist and currently works with us to perfect our mushroom and zoanthid propagation methods.

You may learn more about Salisbury University here: http://www.salisbury.edu/ , the campus is only a few blocks from our home.

Our Solomon Island Coral Mariculture Project

2009-02-01T18:17:00.003-05:00

You may read about our Solomon Island Coral Farm here:

http://www.pacificeastaquaculture.com/Solomon.aspx

Longevity

2009-01-19T14:45:00.007-05:00

I have been a marine aquarium hobbyist for over 40 years! I started keeping freshwater fish in the early 1960's and started my first saltwater aquarium in 1968. I have been involved in this hobby/industry ever since. Our business, Pacific East Aquaculture started about 9 years ago.

I recently found some old literature from the company that I first worked at in Chicago, Marine World. I visited the store in 1969-1970 as a customer and then when my family moved just a couple of blocks away I started working there during my high school years. I did everything from cleaning tanks to packing wholesale orders. Marine World was the premier saltwater shop in the US at that time, they imported fish several times a week from locations around the world. I remember seeing Pinecone fish for the first time from Australia as they glowed in the dark and in those days fish such as Flame angels were considered somewhat rare to be seen in captivity. At the time I had many aquariums, a 30 gallon with anemones and spawning clownfish, a 55 gallon with angels and butterflyfish, a 100 gallon with a Zebra Moray Eel and other larger fish, and an 8 foot long freshwater Amazon river tank with all sorts of rare wild collected fish. I enjoyed my years at Marine World, Don Sporleder the owner and his brother Bruce taught me a lot about the love for the animals.

Here are some photos of the old Marine World wholesale catalog and brochure.

This is a photo from a brochure that shows the retail side of Marine World. Each tank had a diorama behind it and this was loaded with corals and other decor that gave the tanks a deeper look while still allowing easy catching of the fish. The store had freshwater tanks on one side and saltwater on the other with live plant tanks below the freshwater fish rows and invert tanks below the saltwater fish rows and a section of cubes with individual inverts such as shrimps.

This photo shows the wholesale side of the business. Fish that were imported throughout the week were quarantined for at least 7-10 days before they were either shipped out to other stores or moved into the retail store.

Marine World's wholesale catalog published in 1976.

Dr. Mac, yes that is me in the mid 1970's packing wholesale orders.

Limited Edition Corals

2009-01-18T22:26:00.007-05:00

We offer the widest variety of corals available anywhere including a huge selection of our Collector's Reserve Limited Edition Corals. We proudly feature the corals of Jason Fox, our own LE frags, and LE frags from other local coral farmers.

http://www.pacificeastaquaculture.com/ShowProductCategory.aspx?CategoryId=83

1. What makes a coral "Limited Edition"?
For us it means these corals were acquired by us as captive grown frags and grown into colonies or were collected personally by us at the origin and then brought back and grown into colonies, a process in many instances that has taken many years. We have been acquiring and growing these corals for many years and just recently added them for sale on our site. These corals are unique and we house them at a separate location. We take a very limited number of frags from the parent colonies, for some of the slower growing chalices we only offer 1 or 2 frags for sale each year. All of these corals have been grown in captivity and many have been grown for multiple generations in captivity.

2. How do you grow these corals?
Our Limited Edition corals are grown under 1000 watt metal halide lamps (on light movers) or 400 watt metal halide lamps with rapid alternating water flow. We strongly promote the use of natural saltwater parameters for the proper growth of our corals along with intense light levels for most corals. You will note the individual conditions recommended for each coral.

3. Why don't all the frags look exactly like the parent colonies?
The parent colonies have been grown for years in one spot in the systems and when we take frags they are housed in the same system water but in a frag tank and often for a period of time some types of frags will in fact change color, not all types--just some. This is a natural fact of the process of captive propagation of these corals. Our Blue Monster Echinopora parent colony is bright blue with a pink rim, often the frags tend to brown out a bit when first cut. With intense lighting and natural saltwater parameters the frags color up in a few weeks. This same process holds true for most of the Acropora frags. These frags should be looked at as seed stock, the type of corals that you intend to grow for years in your tank and all corals regardless of their origin will change color and growth patterns depending upon each individual system. Often folks will contact us that their frags are actually more colorful than our parent colonies after some time in their systems. Every coral will react differently as it adapts to your husbandry and tank conditions and this is part of the fun of reefkeeping and collecting Limited Edition corals.

Parent colonies of Blue Monster Scroll Echinopora, Fireball Monti cap and Green Monti cap.

Parent colonies of Palys and Zoos

Parent colony of Green Goddess Bird's Nest

Parent colony of our Glowing Green Tabling Acropora

Parent colony of our Joker's Wild Chalice

2009-01-18T11:26:00.003-05:00

An overview of a few of our tanks with our LE corals.

The 1000 watt MH lamps are on light movers.

Chalice corals tend to be very slow growing, we have many new ones we hope to be able to offer for sale this year.

Acropora and Montipora corals are faster growing, but we still only offer a limited nuber of frags for sale from each parent colony.

Cherry Pickin'

2009-01-08T14:08:00.003-05:00

Dr. Mac Hand-Picking Corals at the Importer

Every few weeks I travel out to Los Angeles to hand pick livestock. I usually spend 2-3 days there visiting all the importers and wholesalers. The trick with this is to have the relationships with these companies so I can be there as they are unpacking their shipments because within minutes all the nice corals are picked over and gone in different directions and unless I am standing there myself I can not work for my customers to get the top 1% of the coral coming into the US. Of course with this type of venture I am only in LA for a few days at a time and so one never knows what might be available at any given time, but I always wind up with some incredible livestock. On this trip I picked very few fish as the selection at all the supplires was poor and corals were scarce as well, but a few nice shipments arrived and there I was on the spot hand-picked as the shipments were being unpacked.

It is a detailed process to pick just the very best corals.

Relationships are critical in the process so that I can get in when the shipments are unpacked.

Conservation and Educational Activities

2008-12-28T12:23:00.004-05:00

Over the last 40 years of involvement in this hobby and industry I have heard many hobbyists and businesses talk about saving the reefs or whining about how this hobby is causing "raping" of the reefs. Generally, this talk is never backed up with actions that matter. In contrast, we at Pacific East Aquaculture have invested in reef conservation, regional economic development, and education that make a real difference.

Several years ago I invested many hours and thousands of dollars in our Solomon Island coral farming project. You may read more about that project here:

http://www.pacificeastaquaculture.com/Solomon.aspx

Our project accounts for the sole source of income to local coral farmers and also provides a sustainable supply of desirable corals to our hobby.

On an ongoing basis we sponsor local students, school projects, and tours with education about reefs and conservation. We also have several graduate students that intern at our facility working on research pojects related to coral propagation and conervation.

Retail Outlet-Mardela Springs, MD

2008-11-28T14:04:00.004-05:00

We designed and built our retail outlet 6 years ago. We converted a steel frame warehouse into our 4000 sq. ft. retail outlet and greenhouse coral farm. Above is an overview of our separate fish system and our Caribbean reef with Gorgonians and Sponges (also shown below).

This photo shows an overview of our Caribbean system with Sola Tubes that are lined with highly reflective material that enhance natural sunlight while adding no heat.

This is our soft coral and LPS coral system illuminated with VHO flourescent lighting. We can house several hundred colonies and thousands of frags in this system. We also have another attcahed fiberglass vat that houses our inverts and anemones.

2008-11-28T12:14:00.002-05:00

We added a greenhouse to our building and we grow parent colonies and frags in these fiberglass vats. The vats are 12 feet long and 3 feet wide and 6 inches deep, with some at 18 inches deep.

We grow many soft coreals, zoanthids, LPS corals, Acropora, and other SPS corals in this system.

2008-11-28T12:10:00.005-05:00

Our SPS frag section

Soft Coral Frags

Australian Corals

Acro Frags

2008-11-28T12:08:00.001-05:00

We offer a variety of fish for sale such as the Bluespotted Jawfish shown here.

All the fish we sell are eating and in good health such as these Copperbanded Butterflyfish and Heniochus Bannerfish.
We also offer lots of Tank-raised Clownfish pairs for sale.

There are always hunderds of corals colonies available, shown here are soft coral colonies.

SPS coral colonies.

Livestock Selection

2008-11-27T22:10:00.003-05:00

I have always tried to offer a wide variety of livestock.

While I do offer Australian corals, that is not all we are about. We also offer a huge selection of WYSIWYG frags, Limited Edition frags, coral colonies--soft, LPS and SPS, Pacific and Atlantic inverts, anemones, fish, clams, and more.

Manhattan Reefer Frag Swap

2008-11-25T11:50:00.002-05:00

We attended the Manhattan Reef Club swap this last Sunday and it was a great event as usual. We have been to several of their events and every time we have been so warmly welcomed that we feel like family with so many of the folks in the club.

There were about a dozen livestock vendors at the event so there was an incredible variety of stock for hobbyists to choose from. We sold lots of frags, everything from mushrooms to limited edition rare corals.

New York sometimes gets a reputation of being an aggressive, tough place, but I can honestly say that the reefkeepers there are so friendly and nice that we really enjoy attending their events. Thanks to all of you for making it a memorable gathering!!

Hand-Picking in Los Angeles

2008-11-19T22:36:00.003-05:00

Well I was out hand-picked corals/fish/inverts last Thursday-Saturday. Every 3 weeks I travel to LA to hand-pick livestock. I have been doing this for many years and always pick up many unique items that I would not otherwise have available for our customers.

I fly in and immediately head to the wholesalers/importers. In case you did not know most of the livestock enters the US through LA and is then distributed throughout the country. After dealing with the importers for so long I know the days they get their shipments and the precise time to be there to get the first picks as they unpack. While I see an amazing array of livestock, there is only a small percentage of really cherry pieces. I get into 6-8 different importers, each has their specialty. Some get great Acropora, another has really awesome Euphyllia, and yet another gets super nice leather corals, etc. So, after years of dealing with the different importers I know where and when to go and what to get at each. Beside the corals and fish I hand-pick in LA, we also directly import livestock from several locations and also grow many of our own corals in our coral farming facility. We offer the widest variety of corals.

Watch for photos from my next hand-picking trip scheduled the first week of December.

Welcome to Pacific East Aquaculture

2008-11-09T15:04:00.003-05:00

I would like to introduce myself and tell you about my business, Pacific East Aquaculture, Inc.

I am “Dr. Mac”, a Board Certified veterinarian retired from the poultry industry. My training and veterinary career was in pathology and microbiology research. As a veterinarian I worked for very large corporations and smaller companies and traveled the world extensively doing research and speaking at veterinary conferences. I attended veterinary school a bit later in life and had a couple of careers prior to vet school including working for the FBI as a surveillance photographer.

I have been a marine aquarium hobbyist since 1968. I set up my first tank with an undergravel filter and was quite successful at keeping many types of marine fish over the years with an understanding of the basic nitrogen cycle and not a lot of fancy equipment. During my high school years I worked at a store in the Chicago area called Marine World, one of the nation’s first and largest marine fish importers, wholesalers, and retailers at that time. I learned a lot by working at Marine World and I did everything there from packing wholesale orders to cleaning tanks and unpacking the many shipments that arrived daily from around the world filled with every imaginable marine fish. I vividly recall seeing many rare fish and delighting in the uniqueness of Pineconefish that glowed in the dark and seeing the then rare Flame Angels and Miniatus Groupers that were so sought after by hobbyists at the time. I was very fortunate to have worked at Marine World, the owner Don Sporleder kept the store immaculate and had the philosophy that we were there to educate the hobbyist and try to make them as successful as possible. Over the years Don’s words stuck with me and I operate my own store much the same way now with a dedication to helpful advise and sharing of my experience with hobbyists to make their hobby as joyful and successful as possible. I enjoy talking with fellow hobbyists and will freely share my experiences and enjoy learning from yours. While I have almost 40 years of experience in this hobby I do not consider myself an “expert”, rather I consider myself fortunate to be able to enjoy my time in a hobby I love, sharing and learning daily.

Upon my retirement from active veterinary work I started a small basement internet based business and called it Dr. Mac and Sons Corals. My sons Ben and Zak and my wife Rachel are still very much active in the business. As the business grew over the years with many loyal repeat customers we realized that we needed to expand beyond our basement. In 2003 we purchased an empty steel framed warehouse about 10 minutes from our home and worked for over a year in designing a new state of the art facility--not just a retail reef store but a coral farm and the finest retail outlet in the nation. Working on weekends and evenings we custom built the facility with care and with the idea that we could build something different from the many stores I had visited over the years around the nation and in many other countries during my business travels. From the initial designs we wanted to create something special that a serious hobbyist would enjoy coming to and have it be a memorable experience. Energy efficiency and minimal eco-impact were paramount in our design along with creating the optimum habitat for all the reef creatures we planned to house and propagate.

The facility was completed and opened to the public in November 2004 to large crowds and rave reviews. In the first year of operation we worked out the “bugs” in our systems and perfected our propagation techniques. It was a challenge to get all the small details in place in our greenhouse coral farm, but after a year of study we began to intensively propagate many types of corals. We now grow and have multiple captive grown generations of many types of larger polyp and smaller polyp stony corals, soft corals, zoanthids, Ricordea, and many other corals at our facility.

The fragments we now grow had been taken from healthy wild collected corals. We never take frags from half dead or diseased corals as we have found over the years that these corals have a very poor survival rate. Also, we keep all imported corals we sell for a period of time to be sure they are fully acclimated to captive life before selling them. We do sell wild collected corals and also ocean propagated corals. However, our focus is on propagated corals, both those we grow ourselves and those we import from many South Pacific coral farms in Fiji, Tonga, Bali, Surabaya Java, and the Solomon Islands. We have found that these propagated corals are much easier to keep and survive well in reef aquariums. At Pacific East Aquaculture we have in stock more corals than any other online or retail vendor in the nation!! We also have the healthiest corals, invertebrates, fish, clams, and seahorses. Plus the experienced advice of Dr. Mac free for the asking! On our web site we offer for sale a wide variety of corals and every colony we sell has a photo of the actual piece, what you see is what you get (WYSIWYG).

Our goal is to have available to marine aquarium hobbyists the largest selection of the finest livestock, provide superior customer service, and offer free expert advice so that your buying experience is the best possible. We are dedicated to making you a successful marine aquarium hobbyist.

For the last nine years we have been the number one livestock vendor in the nation, please browse our site and allow us to help you create the marine aquarium of your dreams.

On this blog I will post from time to time showing you a behind the scenes view of our business, check back often to see updates.