who went to beldt's consignment sale??

[witche42]

hi there, just thought i would throw this out there and see who went. i did at about 2 and not much was left but broken aquariums, there was a 150 that looked pretty nice . but the rest was in pretty bad shape. i heard there was a guy selling some live rock and sand there in the morning time, sure wish i would have gotten there earlier.

steven

[TooFar2Sea]

I made it to the consignment sale about 1:30. If there were any bargains they were gone when I got there. I also saw the 150 and thought it was somewhat fairly priced at $175. Not a steal but not a bad deal, either.
Inside the store there weren't many corals and the ones there were kinda expensive while the saltwater fish were surprisingly cheap (compared to other LFS).

[TooFar2Sea]

I've never seen so many leaky tanks in one place.

[jcab2000]

I was there when it opened and didn't see anything of interest. All that was there were a bunch of cracked tanks, old mechanical filters and a few dozen strontium test kits. Does anyone test for strontium? :D Oh yeah, there were also a bunch of weird shaped tanks, like tall hex tanks and corner hexes. I think there was a total of 1 skimmer there that was bought before I saw it.

I was at least looking for a small tank to set up for a quarantine tank. Couldn't even find that. I was pretty disappointed, although it's always fun to look around at the fish and corals. Can you believe that they sell 200 gallon IO for $78?

[TooFar2Sea]

I asked about the strontium tests and was assured that "all the serious reefers test their tanks for LOTS of things, and strontium is one of them". I kept my jokes to myself, being the serious reefer that I am. I noticed that they had the strontium tests for $5 in the sale and for $65 inside the store (speaking of jokes).

[witche42]

hey gary,
where you there with another buddy? i saw a couple of guys looking at the stontium kits around 1:45 and talking to some little short girl that worked there, and i remember her saying how some people need to test for that in their tanks. she also told me that there was some guy there that sold a bunch of lr and ls for 100bucks.

steven

[TooFar2Sea]

That was probably me getting my strontium education. I brought him because he has a pickup truck (wishful thinking) and because he needed some goldfish for his oscar. I wasn't expecting to find anything and I was correct, but it was worth a try.

[jcab2000]

I feel ripped off. I didn't get a strontium education.

[witche42]

and i thought about buying one, gues i will now have to pay 70 bucks,... NOT! :fun2:


steven

[jcab2000]

Oh and about the live rock and sand. I didn't really look at it that closely because I wouldn't trust something out of an unknown tank owned by an unknown person. That's just me.

[Nanook]

Strontium Schmontium...Beldt's is a good FW store, but they lack SW big time. If they were to dedicate a section to coral tanks with decent lighting and filtration, then spend a year on Reef Central, they might be able to hang.

I wish they would get it together, but then I would have to drive all the way out there to see their stuff...this way I don't feel like I am missing out on anything.

Nanook

[TooFar2Sea]

jcab2000: I have to respectfully disagree with your comment about getting candy, I mean live rock, from strangers. When I was setting up my latest tank I replied to a SEASL email about live rock. I ended up getting a great deal from an unknown (at the time) person from their unknown tank (thanks nanook ). The rock had a bit too much macro algae on it for his tastes, I believe, but my little friend (emerald crab) took care of that for me. On another occassion, from another SEASL email, I received (free) about 20 lbs of rock that had been in a tank that was not being maintained regularly. These rocks had a black color to them but my home for wayward rocks has a place for all, so I put them in my sump for a few months. They are now about half covered with coralline algae and look great. While I agree that you must be careful about adding things to your tank, you must also keep an open mind about deals from local reefers.

[wonderboy23]

From what I know Beldt's is trying to change. I have heard they are going to get the live rock off the regular system and dedicate a few large tanks to that and a few to corals. They are starting to get some SPS's in to. Hopefully they will set it up correctly and expand the amount of supplys.

[jcab2000]

TooFar,

I'd feel much safer at least meeting the person selling the live rock. At a consignment sale, you don't know a thing about it and you can't ask any questions about how the person kept their tank. You don't know if the person used RO/DI water or if they treated their tank with copper. In general, I guess I'd trust strangers in the reef hobby, but I don't know that I'd trust that strangers knew what they were doing without asking a few questions first.

[jcab2000]

And who knows? Maybe that LR has a bad strontium problem!:D