I said I would post up a quick review when I had the time so here goes.
I am just a hobbyist so my review is from that perspective, this is the third MACNA I have been too and have helped plan one and have run frag swaps for the past five years so I know a little bit of the planning side.
First off, big congrats to the planners and people from Denver running the show. The venue was excellent and everything was very well done. The hotel was beautiful and a very easy walk into the convention center which was just about the perfect size for the show. Never felt too crowded or hot and not too big and empty. The reception and banquet were both very nice and we enjoyed it.
Speakers: Very much helps having Jake Adams being your speaker liaison, as the lineup was outstanding. From our limited exposure (we did not got to many) Rufus was our favorite and of course the announcing of the tank raised Personatus was the highlight. Luiz was wonderful as the keynote, a lot of information packed into an hour. Really cool to have genetic mapping of fish and showing evolution within fish species.
Dry Goods: I am not really a big dry goods guy as my system is pretty much complete and I just bought new lights. With that being said, there were a lot of cool new stuff. I think Votech might finally have some legit challengers on the powerhead side. The gyre from Coralvue was very impressive and all the hype is legit. The price points on the pump is going to make it very interesting in the powerhead game. The hydro wizard was the other pump that was there and that thing was amazing. 5000gph at 22 watts which is impressive and one of the coolest controllers I have ever seen (you turn a magnet to adjust the speed, and then remove the magnet). About the same price as a vortech, but it is more of a laminar flow and is just impressive. I like the fact that you can put your hands next to it and barely feel any "pull" which is different from the mp60 which can suck small fish into it (something we have a lot of).
Lights wise, AI had a new fixture but it was for smaller tanks so I did not really take a close look at it. Coralvue also has a led/t5 hybrid that I would have liked to see but forgot to check it out. As an owner of the ati hybrid, I think these lights are a perfect balance and glad to see some competition, especially from Giesmann.
Special acknowledgment to Triton Marine and there testing services. I bought several "tests" which you can now send to Unique corals who then sends them to Germany to be tested. This is a gigantic battery of very accurate tests, they even tell you if you are out of variance and by how much. They also tell you how much to dose of what to bring it back in line. This is going to be pretty cool and they were selling kits for 20$ at the show which is a steal. I can't wait for these.
Again, I am not big dry good guy, so I am sure there was a ton more, just what I saw and was paying attention too.
Live Stock: Now this is where I spent 90% of my time.
Fish: The new fish news obviously dominated MACNA (for us anyways). Obviously getting the news of tank bred Masked Angels and even having one up for raffle was amazing. We did not win, but it went to an outstanding home. Can't wait to see more of these around and also excited to hear there are groups of angels going to breeding programs so hopefully these will become plentiful in the hobby. My second favorite fish was the lightning maroons which are now down to the F2 generation and will be going up for sale soon. These held their patterns very well and were super cool. I have heard they are not as aggressive as normal maroons, but we will see. I think a pair of these for our 34g might just have to happen next year. The other fish of note was the fancy clowns, some will love them and some will hate them but they will be for sale next year (check pics at the bottom). There were some cool fish for sale there too (bandits, gems, goldflakes, golden dwarf eels, and a lot of the bread and butter stuff) but we did not buy any fish.
Coral: Have to love MACNA for this. I could write pages on this but I will try and break it down to keep this shorter. Remember, this is all subjective to our taste and a few of our friends who we talked to. I am sure I am forgetting some things and if I did not mention a vendor by name here, nothing personal, I spent a lot of money with a lot of people lol.
What was "hot": Bounce mushrooms still commanded high prices and sold within the first day before lunch time. Shrooms were once again hot as there were many different kinds and many colors. They seem to have sold really well. SPS was also pretty "hot" as a lot of booths were dominated by them.
SPS:
Best single frag: WWC *** acro, Vic only brought two and they sold within the first hour. Really just a stunning rainbow type, one is coming to Jersey (not me) so keep an eye our for that one. The one I did by from them, the WWC Ding Dang millie is also a stunner, those two really just stood out.
Best SPS overall: Age of Aquariums (JW), just a really solid collection of huge, encrusted frags. Even his 200$ plus stuff was just so healthy and happy. Really good guy to deal with and you will have to buy from him if you like SPS.
Random stuff: Cherry's new millie that they brought to the swap was really nice, bought a frag. Jason Fox's stuff was of course amazing, bought several. If I had not just dropped a ton on the live sale, I would have bought more from Gonzo. Also special shot out to a member on here who was selling there alongside some friends, bought some stunners form him and he hooked me up (not going to post a name as I don't want to start anything). Lastly, ORA has of course outstanding SPS in their tank (not for sale) but they have a few newer SPS frags coming that are really cool.
LPS:
Best single frags: Blastos from Zoanthids.com (ironic right?). They were stunners and they just barely eclipsed the favias he was selling. I was shocked (but really shouldn't be because I have know Brandon for a few years now) that I did not buy any zoas from zoanthids.com but got amazing LPS.
Best LPS overall: Really hard to say, again pick any of the top guns. Carolina aquatics had some great acan colonies like last year. I am probably going to regret not getting the mai tai acans from Gonzo, they were stunners. Cherry of course has top shelf acans as well, they had some rainbows that were mind blowing. FYI, their corals are the same in person as in pics, the acans are actually that nice.
Zoas:
My favorite arena, they were strong this year, but it seems the focus has shifted a bit (thank God).
Best single frags: Adonis from Reefers cove, talked to addicting and they lost theirs so tougher to find and rank right next to hallucinations as far as looks. Glad I got a frag.
Best overall: Zoanthids.com had all the majors covered, so did Reefers cove. Special mention to Reefkoi who brought a ton of really nice, fairly priced zoas. Bought a bunch from him, including some of the best space monsters I have seen in a while. Value wise, zoas were probably the way to go, you could have picked up a ton at good prices.
Shrooms:
Still the belle of the ball.
Best single frags: The large bounce mushrooms. They still commanded north of 1000$ and sold out within the first few hours of the show. The amount of jawbreakers was pretty cool as well and they went fast. Prices on these are not falling one bit which is a surprise, but they are solid. If there was one area with some ridiculous prices though, this was it. There was a jawbreaker mother that was nice (orange and green), but not 1500$ nice that it was for sale for. Any type of bounce shroom with any "bubbles" on it was going to be minimum 350$.
Best overall: Hard to say, all the majors had the bounces. Special shout out again to zoanthids.com who had these amazing huge ric type shrooms that were like 4-5 inches across and like 2 inches tall. They both sold before I got to his booth the first time, so they went fast. Kudos to whoever got those stunners. I did manage to score some great shrooms from reefers cove and mind blowing corals at very reasonable prices. Actually really excited for those, keep your eyes out, there are going to be some stunning morphs coming out soon.
What was "cold":
Chalices were pretty cold. Don't get me wrong, they still sold as I saw quite a few rainbows in the sold sections in booths, however they were not the front and center pieces. There was also really nothing new and exciting. People are buying rainbows now because they are affordable form what they once were. What used to be 1000$ plus is now 300-500 so people were buying those. I don't remember even seeing any convict types. The coolest one (outside a rainbow) was a mycedium from zoanthids.com that looked like a pectinia, but wasn't. That was really the only "new" chalice out there.
Should you go to a MACNA? YES
If you can make the DC trip next year, I would go in a heartbeat. You will see amazing speakers and vendors in person which is really the best part. For all we argue about photoshop and saturation, that all disappears when you see it in person. It will make you appreciate your favorite vendors even more you get to meet them and see their amazing corals in front of you. You also get a sense of how much work goes into going to a show and you how much that means to the clubs that frag swaps are important too. Also when you see, big, healthy, chunky frags in front of you, you understand why WYSIWYG and aqua culturing is so important. Then you realize why some vendors don't go to shows, because they could not compete with the professionals there.
Pics: (I will upload some coral shot later, this is what I had up on PB so far)
These are the fancy clowns, they were isolated and easy to take a picture of so here you go:
Raffle for the Personatus (sorry for the blurs)
TSA letting me know they check out my frags:
Floating at 12:45 am when we got home
I am just a hobbyist so my review is from that perspective, this is the third MACNA I have been too and have helped plan one and have run frag swaps for the past five years so I know a little bit of the planning side.
First off, big congrats to the planners and people from Denver running the show. The venue was excellent and everything was very well done. The hotel was beautiful and a very easy walk into the convention center which was just about the perfect size for the show. Never felt too crowded or hot and not too big and empty. The reception and banquet were both very nice and we enjoyed it.
Speakers: Very much helps having Jake Adams being your speaker liaison, as the lineup was outstanding. From our limited exposure (we did not got to many) Rufus was our favorite and of course the announcing of the tank raised Personatus was the highlight. Luiz was wonderful as the keynote, a lot of information packed into an hour. Really cool to have genetic mapping of fish and showing evolution within fish species.
Dry Goods: I am not really a big dry goods guy as my system is pretty much complete and I just bought new lights. With that being said, there were a lot of cool new stuff. I think Votech might finally have some legit challengers on the powerhead side. The gyre from Coralvue was very impressive and all the hype is legit. The price points on the pump is going to make it very interesting in the powerhead game. The hydro wizard was the other pump that was there and that thing was amazing. 5000gph at 22 watts which is impressive and one of the coolest controllers I have ever seen (you turn a magnet to adjust the speed, and then remove the magnet). About the same price as a vortech, but it is more of a laminar flow and is just impressive. I like the fact that you can put your hands next to it and barely feel any "pull" which is different from the mp60 which can suck small fish into it (something we have a lot of).
Lights wise, AI had a new fixture but it was for smaller tanks so I did not really take a close look at it. Coralvue also has a led/t5 hybrid that I would have liked to see but forgot to check it out. As an owner of the ati hybrid, I think these lights are a perfect balance and glad to see some competition, especially from Giesmann.
Special acknowledgment to Triton Marine and there testing services. I bought several "tests" which you can now send to Unique corals who then sends them to Germany to be tested. This is a gigantic battery of very accurate tests, they even tell you if you are out of variance and by how much. They also tell you how much to dose of what to bring it back in line. This is going to be pretty cool and they were selling kits for 20$ at the show which is a steal. I can't wait for these.
Again, I am not big dry good guy, so I am sure there was a ton more, just what I saw and was paying attention too.
Live Stock: Now this is where I spent 90% of my time.
Fish: The new fish news obviously dominated MACNA (for us anyways). Obviously getting the news of tank bred Masked Angels and even having one up for raffle was amazing. We did not win, but it went to an outstanding home. Can't wait to see more of these around and also excited to hear there are groups of angels going to breeding programs so hopefully these will become plentiful in the hobby. My second favorite fish was the lightning maroons which are now down to the F2 generation and will be going up for sale soon. These held their patterns very well and were super cool. I have heard they are not as aggressive as normal maroons, but we will see. I think a pair of these for our 34g might just have to happen next year. The other fish of note was the fancy clowns, some will love them and some will hate them but they will be for sale next year (check pics at the bottom). There were some cool fish for sale there too (bandits, gems, goldflakes, golden dwarf eels, and a lot of the bread and butter stuff) but we did not buy any fish.
Coral: Have to love MACNA for this. I could write pages on this but I will try and break it down to keep this shorter. Remember, this is all subjective to our taste and a few of our friends who we talked to. I am sure I am forgetting some things and if I did not mention a vendor by name here, nothing personal, I spent a lot of money with a lot of people lol.
What was "hot": Bounce mushrooms still commanded high prices and sold within the first day before lunch time. Shrooms were once again hot as there were many different kinds and many colors. They seem to have sold really well. SPS was also pretty "hot" as a lot of booths were dominated by them.
SPS:
Best single frag: WWC *** acro, Vic only brought two and they sold within the first hour. Really just a stunning rainbow type, one is coming to Jersey (not me) so keep an eye our for that one. The one I did by from them, the WWC Ding Dang millie is also a stunner, those two really just stood out.
Best SPS overall: Age of Aquariums (JW), just a really solid collection of huge, encrusted frags. Even his 200$ plus stuff was just so healthy and happy. Really good guy to deal with and you will have to buy from him if you like SPS.
Random stuff: Cherry's new millie that they brought to the swap was really nice, bought a frag. Jason Fox's stuff was of course amazing, bought several. If I had not just dropped a ton on the live sale, I would have bought more from Gonzo. Also special shot out to a member on here who was selling there alongside some friends, bought some stunners form him and he hooked me up (not going to post a name as I don't want to start anything). Lastly, ORA has of course outstanding SPS in their tank (not for sale) but they have a few newer SPS frags coming that are really cool.
LPS:
Best single frags: Blastos from Zoanthids.com (ironic right?). They were stunners and they just barely eclipsed the favias he was selling. I was shocked (but really shouldn't be because I have know Brandon for a few years now) that I did not buy any zoas from zoanthids.com but got amazing LPS.
Best LPS overall: Really hard to say, again pick any of the top guns. Carolina aquatics had some great acan colonies like last year. I am probably going to regret not getting the mai tai acans from Gonzo, they were stunners. Cherry of course has top shelf acans as well, they had some rainbows that were mind blowing. FYI, their corals are the same in person as in pics, the acans are actually that nice.
Zoas:
My favorite arena, they were strong this year, but it seems the focus has shifted a bit (thank God).
Best single frags: Adonis from Reefers cove, talked to addicting and they lost theirs so tougher to find and rank right next to hallucinations as far as looks. Glad I got a frag.
Best overall: Zoanthids.com had all the majors covered, so did Reefers cove. Special mention to Reefkoi who brought a ton of really nice, fairly priced zoas. Bought a bunch from him, including some of the best space monsters I have seen in a while. Value wise, zoas were probably the way to go, you could have picked up a ton at good prices.
Shrooms:
Still the belle of the ball.
Best single frags: The large bounce mushrooms. They still commanded north of 1000$ and sold out within the first few hours of the show. The amount of jawbreakers was pretty cool as well and they went fast. Prices on these are not falling one bit which is a surprise, but they are solid. If there was one area with some ridiculous prices though, this was it. There was a jawbreaker mother that was nice (orange and green), but not 1500$ nice that it was for sale for. Any type of bounce shroom with any "bubbles" on it was going to be minimum 350$.
Best overall: Hard to say, all the majors had the bounces. Special shout out again to zoanthids.com who had these amazing huge ric type shrooms that were like 4-5 inches across and like 2 inches tall. They both sold before I got to his booth the first time, so they went fast. Kudos to whoever got those stunners. I did manage to score some great shrooms from reefers cove and mind blowing corals at very reasonable prices. Actually really excited for those, keep your eyes out, there are going to be some stunning morphs coming out soon.
What was "cold":
Chalices were pretty cold. Don't get me wrong, they still sold as I saw quite a few rainbows in the sold sections in booths, however they were not the front and center pieces. There was also really nothing new and exciting. People are buying rainbows now because they are affordable form what they once were. What used to be 1000$ plus is now 300-500 so people were buying those. I don't remember even seeing any convict types. The coolest one (outside a rainbow) was a mycedium from zoanthids.com that looked like a pectinia, but wasn't. That was really the only "new" chalice out there.
Should you go to a MACNA? YES
If you can make the DC trip next year, I would go in a heartbeat. You will see amazing speakers and vendors in person which is really the best part. For all we argue about photoshop and saturation, that all disappears when you see it in person. It will make you appreciate your favorite vendors even more you get to meet them and see their amazing corals in front of you. You also get a sense of how much work goes into going to a show and you how much that means to the clubs that frag swaps are important too. Also when you see, big, healthy, chunky frags in front of you, you understand why WYSIWYG and aqua culturing is so important. Then you realize why some vendors don't go to shows, because they could not compete with the professionals there.
Pics: (I will upload some coral shot later, this is what I had up on PB so far)
These are the fancy clowns, they were isolated and easy to take a picture of so here you go:
Raffle for the Personatus (sorry for the blurs)
TSA letting me know they check out my frags:
Floating at 12:45 am when we got home
