Euphyllia ancora, the wall hammer is the coral of the year

Some years of the reef keeping hobby bring us new varieties and new species of corals for us to enjoy, but in 2013, the wall hammer was incredibly well represented across the globe. Euphyllia ancora, the wall hammer coral with the…

2013 Marine Breeder’s Year in Review part 2

This is the second part of our annual Marine Breeder’s Year in Review, part 1 can be seen here.  4th Annual Marine Breeding Initiative (MBI) Breeder’s Workshop To say it’s been a busy year is an understatement, so much so…

Reef Builders Editor’s Choice: 10 best products of 2013

It’s that time of year again, that time when we get to share with you the finest new products that greatly improved our reefkeeping experience over the last orbit of the earth around the Sun. Compared to last year’s Editor’s…

2013 Marine Breeder’s Year in Review

It’s the 4th annual installment of the Marine Breeder’s Year in Review (see past installments at 2010, 2011a, 2011b, and 2012) and frankly, it’s been an interesting if not arguably “slow” year for a change, and yet I’ll probably write more…

Jake and Mark talk about reefs over beers

Writing short and brief blog posts and occasionally articles about the state of the marine aquarium hobby, is both liberating and limiting. On the one hand we are not hamstrung to recount an entire story about a single topic, just…

Digiman revisits BlueHarbor and closes 2013 with a spectacular bang

We are closing this year with one last travel story and it’s contributed again by rare fish expert Digiman from Singapore. Following up on his Hong Kong trip, Digiman visited Japan as a final pit stop to his year end…

Our top six smashing aquarium debuts of 2013

Here’s another 2013 recap, but this time, we’re featuring smashing aquarium debuts of 2013. Yes that’s right, 2013 is a year of first times, and these five fishes have had their moment in the spotlight in the past months. While…

Reef Builder’s recap on 2013’s most alluring hybrids

We wouldn’t be doing our job if we didn’t cover any hybrids this year, and like the hardworking elves at Santa’s factory, we made sure we did it with glitter and bow ribbons. This year we had our fair share…

2013 recap: Top six breakthrough aquarium fish

2013 is ending really soon and as always, we have our yearly recap on what’s hot in the aquarium scene. Before this year, these fish were almost always either unknown of, or simply classified as “book fishes”. Today’s post will feature…

Five best new coral species of 2013

Over the past 12 months, there was a slow steady trickle of new species being described. We didn’t have any sensational new species like new Acros in 2012, or any wild Astreopora like in 2011, but we did get some new chalice,…