Sometime this summer Aqua Medic of North America began expanding its business from just hard goods to the import and wholesale of live corals with a new division called Aqua Medic Live. Aqua Medic itself is a well-established brand and manufacturer of many readers’ first metal halide lights, among many other products. We visited the new facility in Loveland Colorado and came away very impressed with the new directions that Aqua Medic is going with its Live business.
The North American arm of the venerable aquarium company has always been an oddball among the various branches of Aqua Medic but it seems like the super progressive reef scene in North America is rubbing off on them. What makes Aqua Medic Live really stand out is the energy of the place, they’ve got a lot going on.
The Aqua Medic warehouse is home to a huge inventory of products, it houses Aquarium Water Testing, and now the Aqua Medic Live division is one of the biggest displays of Aqua Medic products in use we’ve ever seen. Aqua Medic sumps, refugiums and top off tanks are all in use and in full glory on the coral holding systems – all using salt water made with their new and improved AB Reef Salt mix. Even the relatively unknown Aqua Medic controller is employed to manage an impressive amount of equipment.
What really bodes well for the future of Aqua Medic Live is the close quarters within which the staff all work and have their own aquariums right next to the coral holding tanks. The place is clean, quiet and looks uber modern through the use of modular Aluminum framing that is used for everything from the stands to the suspension for the lights. With a ton of pet fish in the place including that old pair of black ocellaris, and being willing to DIY Kessil LED spots into the Ocean Light tells us that everything about the new Aqua Medic Live facility is to put the corals’ needs first.
Of course, what matters most in a live coral dealing facility is the health and quality of the corals. We visited Aqua Medic Live in between shipments so the stock wasn’t at full capacity but it was still extremely nice. The quality of the Euphyllia corals coming from Australia and Indonesia is unbelievable these days.
With the facility being run by a ton of reef nerds, there’s some special corals being put into propagation but it’s still too soon for many of these to be available. Aqua Medic doesn’t yet have a webpage up for their Live division but you can reach them through Aqua Medic’s main website all the same.
Correction: AquaMedicLIVE.com
