eddi March 22, 2004 March 22, 2004 Saturday Byron and I met Dr. Mac at his store in Maldera Springs and he gave us a tour of the facility. While he is still a long way away from opening, I think the store is going to be impressive. The location is kind of odd (in the middle of a residential area), but it is right off route 50. His corals will be housed in vats, 10' x 3' x 18" (he has some that are 12" in height). He built a 'sun room' with 4 or 6 vats (forgive me, memory is the first to go when you get old) where he will house all frags. All these vats will be exposed to sunlight. The temperature was in the low 40's when we were there, it was rather windy, the heat was off in the store, it was around 11:30 and the sunroom was already very warm. I can't imagine what it will be like in the middle of August. Inside the covered store he will have vats for SPS colonies, LPS and softies. One vat will be for cured live rock and one for clams. He will also have smaller tanks on a seprate system for fish and inverts. He had to replumb the vats to make what he called 'closed loops', to ensure that there will be even pressure throughout each vat. The system is powered by 4 large (he did not remember the GPH), programmable pumps and he has an 8' tall skimmer. In the back room he has two 500 gallon containers for uncured rocks and several smaller 200 gallon ones for fresh and salt water. His water comes from a deep well and is rich in sulphur, therefore he will have to inject chlorine to neutralize or remove the sulphur, then run the water through a large carbon canister and finally through a DI unit. His current dry goods stock is rather limited but he plans on expanding that as well. The original goal was open up in June, and while he still has that goal it is becoming more and more likely than he will not make it. Most of the vats are plumbed; the fish and inverts tanks as well as the live rock and clam vats are not. He plans on running his e-mail business form the store during the week and be open for retail on the weekend (or in the week by appointment). It is a minimum of a four hour drive and therefore he probably will not put a huge dent in the local store's business, but it is neverthless going to be nice having a well stocked, high quality store withing driving range.
ReefMon March 22, 2004 March 22, 2004 [nana] [hro [nana] Thanks Eddy! I can't wait to see it in person! Sound like we should plan a WAMAS road trip in August to help Dr Mac celebrate his grand opening!!!!!!!
Guest tgallo March 26, 2004 March 26, 2004 well, i guess i will have to cancel my dive trip and spend the cash with dr mac instead.
gastone March 27, 2004 March 27, 2004 Thanks again Eddi for picking up the BTA for me from Dr. Mac. It has acclimated well even though the premnas like to beat the heck out of it.
Guest goblinshark March 27, 2004 March 27, 2004 arrrr... id love to go but ill be snorkling and diving at seacamp in the florida keys alll augest can we do it in july?
Guest Rivah Rat March 28, 2004 March 28, 2004 goblinshark, do you mean you are going to Seabase camp? I went last year and had a great time.
Guest Bemmer March 31, 2004 March 31, 2004 Hey Eddi, Thanks for the write up. Did you say it took four hours to drive to his new location? Wow, that definately is a long way away. I was so hoping for closer. Count me in on a road trip this summer...if we take an air conditioned bus. :D
eddi March 31, 2004 Author March 31, 2004 Rebecca, Welcome back, how was your trip? Or are you still in SF? It took us about 2.5 hours to get there from my house, but this was early on a Saturday morning with little traffic. Of course, Byron was driving so it would have taken a decent driver only about half the time! tng Eddi
Caribbean Jake March 31, 2004 March 31, 2004 If you guys plan to visit Dr. Mac, please count me in. I can use some frags on my 6 month old 55 gal. Jacob
Gatortailale March 31, 2004 March 31, 2004 If you guys plan to visit Dr. Mac, please count me in. I can use some frags on my 6 month old 55 gal.Jacob Mac will be at the spring meeting in 2 weeks. Contact him to pre-order stuff. He does bring 4+ boxes of stuff, but it goes fast. Best to pre-order it and you get FREE shipping. [nana] [nana] [nana]
Guest Rivah Rat April 5, 2004 April 5, 2004 Seabase is a Boy Scout camp for scuba diving, it's in the keys. I took a bunch of scouts there last summer. It's probably in the same area, you should have some good diving.
mutley29 April 5, 2004 April 5, 2004 I have bought online from Dr Mac and the quality was superb, can't wait to visit the new facility and hand pick my purchases straight from the vats. will be a bit of a drive for me though, but worth it [dr] [beer2] Anton
eddi April 5, 2004 Author April 5, 2004 Anton, I have a feeling you will not have too many problems finding people to go with you....
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