hopkisag1 worst packaging ever, dead corals, and lies

[flyyyguy]

I purchased 10 purple deaths and 3 headless horseman palys for hopkisag1 for $268. Odd number becasue he wanted paypal fees or something like that........

anyways....

In the time before we made the agreement and the corals were shipped I added 3 polyps of what were supposed to be spiderman zoas from vivid aquarium for $70. I didnt end up sending the $70 in the time we added the "spiderman" zoas and receiving the order. And thankfully so as it would have just been $70 more dollars lost.

EDIT: The $70 was for the spidermans and another $10 frag. The $10 frag was DOA in the same shape as the purple deaths.

Here is what i received. Bags were wrapped in bubble wrap and thrown into a box. I cant imagine how someone could think that is ok for any frags...much less supposedly high end stuff shipping to Oregon in November.

Here are the corals when I recieved them

Purple Deaths. I left the frag in one of my tanks for 48 hours and watched it get worse from starting off in the shape you see and then tossed it.





And here are the "headless horseman" palythoa. Note that shipped poorly or not, they could actually fit inside the mouths of the RPE's in the background. Im not buying they really were headless horsemen in the first place. WAY too tiny. Only a couple of zoanthids have i ever seen that were so small. I watched them continue to rot until there was no way and tossed them like the Purple Deaths. Whether they were or they werent, while these werent in quite as bad of shape as the purple deaths, they didnt have a chance.




And here are the "spidermans" from Vivid aquarium found here.

Note they are zoanthids. The green things with the red skirts I recieved are palythoa.

http://www.vividaquariums.com/10Expa...ode=05-5118-10

I will add that while i do run 10k bulbs, my camera is custom white balanced to them. The color that you see is true to life. If there was any blue there to be seen you would see it regardless of the bulbs. And I dont think they morphed from blue to green in the time that it took for him to ship them. His argument was that I use 10k bulbs and things look different under different lighting. If anyone would like I can post countless other brilliantly blue corals I keep under these lights.

anyway.....here are the "spiderman zoanthids". There were two of these that survived, i watched that third one at the bottom start to go so I cut the two that are open out in a effort to maybe not let it spread and it worked. The two green palys with the red skirts are fine.




Here is what kills me. Here are a couple quotes of a few of the things that he said when we were trying to reach some kind of resolve. Good thing im not so gullible to be looking at dead corals right in front of me, and believe somebody when they tell me everything is just fine and I actually got a GOOD deal.

"everything you paid for is alive and well."

"I sent you $420 worth of frags and you only paid for $260. The purple deaths and spiderman will survive. Thats $140 that came out of my pocket. It pays for the headless horseman and the spiderman even though half of those will survive."

We did come to a agreement that he was going to send me 7 purple deaths as well as pay for shipping. After I ended up talking to someone else that also purchased the other unhealthy half of his advertised purple deaths from him that died quickly after being introduced, I really regretted being so generous and making that agreement with him. At the time I figured anything I squeeze out of this piece of ____ would be a bonus, but knowing that the other PD's he shipped were sick and died on the guy who bought them, I didnt watn any more of his sick/diseased whatever corals even shipped to me.

Then I PM'd him asking when he was going to ship, I saw he read it, ignored it and thats when I said enough is enough. He really owes me the order in full as it was placed. For the 10 PD's, 3 HH's, and the 3 spiderman zoanthids I paid $268 dollars for, all I have to show for it is a $50 bill on my fed ex account, and 2 palys that while kind of cool, I wouldnt sell for more than 5-8 polyp.

Just to make this go away I will accept a $200 refund. That is paying him $78 for those two green palys.

Here was his reply to that:

"And another thing. The purple deaths you have aren't dead"

"Why should I send you money back, when the coral is still alive? Because they weren't happy when they arrived? Shipping isn't always nice on coral, but they come around. I will not refund for anything that wasn't DOA."



That was AN HOUR ago he said that. They were tossed in the trash long ago at this point.


This guy gives all of us who take selling and shipping healthy livestock seriously a bad name.

Thanks Hopsikag for the absolute worst buying experience I have ever had on reef central, and ive had a couple that werent so good.