If you are mulling over whether you should purchase your liver rock from KP Aquatics, stop now, and proceed with your purchase. I received my 35 lbs shipment this week, and I am beyond pleased with the quality of rock that I received. The rock is covered with an abundant amount of coralline algae – shades of orange, dark (reddish) orange, light pink and purple. There are also a bunch of feather dusters and a few cool clusters of Halimeda (i.e. money plant algae). In addition, there were also some cool hitchhikers – a couple of small serpent stars, pencil urchin, bright blue nudibranch, red mithrax crab. So far, I have not seen any pests, but even if there are a few unwanted hitchhikers, it’s not a big deal because they can be addressed — I believe the benefits of instantly adding a diverse and beneficial bacteria biome to your aquarium — by using live rock — far outweigh the negatives (i.e. unwanted hitchhikers). Lastly, the packing job was fantastic – it included a thick foam cooler, double bagged rock (wrapped in wet shipping paper), fiberglass insulation (sealed in plastic bag), and a couple of heat packs. I contribute the lack of die off to this A+ packing job and overnight door-to-door shipping (when I opened the bags I smelled a nice healthy ocean scent, not a spoiled or rotting scent). I will definitely be ordering other items from KP Aquatics in the near future.
–Joel
