by Joe Russo | May 29, 2015 | Invertebrates, Science
Just keep staring into the hypnotizing abyss. Not quite a buzzing cartoon toad from a distant future on Earth, this iridescently patterned nudibranch was collected for photography purposes in just 30 feet of water off the eastern coast of Florida by Farside... by AquaNerd | Dec 15, 2014 | Corals, Eye Candy, Science
We don’t know what they’re called, and frankly, we don’t care what they’re called. These are some amazing zoanthids, regardless of their given trade name, and their colors are popping right out of the screen. We spied this awesome colony at a local frag swap, hypnotizing us under the blue glow of one of the vendors at the show. The coral features some sharply contrasting colors, including a neon green mouth surrounded by a dark center, a neon pink ring, another dark section, and tentacles tipped in neon green. The alternating colors, coupled with the utter vibrancy of the neons make this a nice piece of eye candy. by AquaNerd | Oct 20, 2014 | Corals, Equipment, Eye Candy, Science
MORE: This Rainbow Plate Coral is Beyond... by AquaNerd | May 23, 2014 | Corals, Eye Candy, Science
We’re trying something a little different with this post and pitting two coral vendors against each other in a no holds barred battle to the death. Wait, we took that a little too far. Back it up just a minute. Over the last couple of days, we stumbled across a pair of Rainbow Blastomussa corals from two different vendors, and coincidentally both of them on the Reef2Reef forums. The Coral Kings posted their rainbow Blastomussa wellsi back in April, while World Wide Corals just yesterday shared their own beauty, what appears to be a rainbow B. merletti. Not being able to get either of these corals out of our minds, we figured we’d have a little fun with them. So, which of these two rainbow blastos do you like more? The more refined blasto from The Coral Kings that has a more strictly defined color pattern or the more raw blasto from World Wide Corals, whose color blends more freely and polyps appear more untamed? by AquaNerd | Sep 30, 2013 | Equipment, Tanks
Have you ever had a piece of equipment that you thought just looked too darned pretty to be in that nasty saltwater with fish poop and gross algae? Well, such is the case for the Omega 150 protein skimmer, which Vertex so kindly sent our way. Unfortunately for the skimmer, we don’t plan on letting it stay eye candy for long, as we’ll put it through the ringer as we review it in an everyday aquarium environment. To start our review, we’ll first dive into a little product history. The Omega line of skimmers was first introduced at MACNA 2012 in Dallas, and we were told that it was meant to completely replace the Vertex IN skimmers. To keep its price down around that of the IN series and to better distinguish itself from the Vertex Alpha skimmers, the Omega used a Sicce pump instead of the Red Dragon. Additionally, the straight cone shape was ditched for the more elegant “whine glass” cone body.
